The New Power Party (NPP) yesterday announced new regulations on nominating candidates for next year’s legislative elections and said that incumbents would not be given priority over other candidates.
Under the regulations passed on Tuesday, a nomination panel of five members would be responsible for consulting potential candidates, incumbents and heads of local chapters to find the ideal candidates.
After evaluating potential candidates, the panel is to send a list of nominees to the party’s decisionmaking body, which would vote on whether to confirm the nominees.
Photo: Peng Wan-hsin, Taipei Times
If multiple party members are seeking the nomination in the same constituency, the panel would facilitate mediation among them and, if necessary, conduct a primary, for which more regulations are to be set down.
The regulations allow the party to find new candidates in three ways, NPP spokesman Lee Chao-li (李兆立) said.
The nomination panel is to scout potential candidates as well as accept recommendations from chapter heads, he said.
Members of the public who wish to join the legislative race representing the party may e-mail their resume, platform and a statement of purpose to 2020@npptw.org by May 10, he added.
Asked how many legislative candidates the party is planning to nominate and whether all of its incumbent legislators are to run for re-election, NPP Secretary-General Chen Meng-hsiu (陳孟秀) said that the evaluation process is still ongoing and the first wave of candidates would be announced after May 10.
“The party will not be absent in next year’s legislative election,” she said. “We will find talented individuals to compete.”
Asked whether incumbents would be given priority over other potential candidates, she said: “There is no such thing [in the regulations] that would give incumbent legislators priority over others.”
So far, NPP Legislator Freddy Lim (林昶佐) of Taipei’s Zhongzheng-Wanhua (中正-萬華) electoral district is the only one of the party’s five incumbent legislators who has announced their intention to seek re-election.
He would likely have to compete with NPP Legislator Hsu Yung-ming’s (徐永明) assistant, Li Cheng-chih (李承值), who last week expressed interest in seeking the party’s nomination in Lim’s constituency.
Asked if the NPP would nominate a presidential candidate, Chen said that the nomination panel is responsible for nominating candidates for the legislative and presidential elections.
While it is to deal with the legislative election first, “work in other areas is also under way,” she said, adding that announcements would be made as soon as matters are decided.
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