Four of the five Taipei mayoral candidates yesterday squared off in their second televised policy presentation, with Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) and independent candidate Lee Hsi-kun (李錫錕) criticizing Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) over the cancelation of annual cash payouts to senior residents and the stalled Taipei Dome project.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate Pasuya Yao (姚文智) was absent from the presentation, as he was attending a campaign parade at which he announced that he would resign from his lawmaker post to focus on the election.
Ko, an independent candidate seeking re-election, said he scrapped the annual Double Ninth Festival cash payments to senior residents to build a lasting and comprehensive care system for the elderly, such as government-funded vaccinations, senior citizen cards that are charged with NT$480 every month to encourage them to be physically active and meal-sharing stations to keep them connected to society.
Photo: Shen Pei-yao, Taipei Times
The city still distributes cash to elderly residents from low and middle-income households, he said.
Many of the issues related to the city’s stalled construction projects stem from high election spending, complicated relationships between the local government and businesses, and an opaque decisionmaking mechanism, Ko said.
He did not choose the problematic location of the Taipei Dome, did not hand over the plot worth tens of billions of New Taiwan dollars to the contractor with zero royalty payments, nor allowed it to change the blueprint after the contract was signed, Ko said, adding that his administration had to halt the construction because it was illegal and unsafe.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
Ting accused Ko of lying to gain the support of both the pan-green and pan-blue camps.
Ko has failed to deliver on many of the campaign promises he made for the 2014 election, Ting said, adding that Ko lacks a global vision, leadership skills and clear political views.
Ting said he is experienced in pushing forward bills, so he is confident that he can speed up urban renewal efforts and attract investment.
Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Taipei Times
Praising Ko for his hardworking character, Lee said Ko is more suited to the position of a department head, but not the mayor, because he lacks vision and the ability to let the city’s economy take flight.
The annual cash payment to elderly residents should be increased to NT$6,000, Lee said.
He promoted his policy of developing a “night-time economy” similar to that of London to boost Taipei’s economy by creating jobs and attracting visitors from abroad.
Independent candidate Wu E-yang (吳萼洋) — who attracted media attention by touting honey lemonade as a panacea to a variety of illnesses and singing on the only televised debate attended by all five candidates broadcast on Public Television Service on Nov. 8 — yesterday urged Taipei residents to vote for him so that he can “train Ko to become the president.”
Ko lacks leniency, wisdom, administrative execution ability and tolerance, but he is smart, learns fast and is fit, Wu said, adding that Ko can be his deputy mayor as part of his training if he is elected.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching