Kaohsiung Mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) presidential candidate, has the lowest job approval rate of the six special municipality mayors and county commissioners, while Pingtung County Commissioner Pan Men-an (潘孟安) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has the highest, a poll released yesterday by Chinese-language Commonwealth Magazine showed.
Pan, who was widely praised for organizing a successful national lantern festival in February, topped the chart with a score of 77.54, while Han, in 22nd place, had 42.09, the magazine said.
Lienchiang County Commissioner Liu Tseng-ying (劉增應), a KMT member who placed first in the past three years, came in second this year with a score of 75.78.
Photo: Chang Chung-yi, Taipei Times
Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), who ranked 12th last year, fell to 20th place this year, while Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) of the KMT came in 21st.
New Taipei City Hou You-yi (侯友宜) of the KMT placed 7th, even though he is in his first year.
His rating is the best ranking the KMT has achieved in the city in 14 years.
Taichung Information Bureau Director-General Wu Huang-sheng (吳皇昇) said that although the city’s ranking has remained the fifth out of the six special municipalities, it received the second-best score in the education and culture category.
Taipei City Government spokesman Tom Chou (周台竹) said Ko’s ranking might have fallen due to the growing scrutiny of him amid rumors that he might run in next year’s presidential election, or support another independent candidate.
Increased media coverage about next year’s elections has basically distracted the public from Ko’s government’s achievements, Taipei City Government deputy spokesman Tai You-wen (戴于文) said, adding that city officials would humbly review their performance.
The magazine’s poll, conducted from July 18 to Aug. 22, asked about the heads of government as well as each city and county government group, and was the first conducted since the nine-in-one elections on Nov. 24 last year.
A total of 14,818 valid samples from the public were collected and 613 experts recommended by civil groups were interviewed, with the responses from the public and experts were weighted at 80 percent and 20 percent respectively. The poll had a margin of error of 3.1 to 6.9 percentage points.
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