Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), chairman of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), yesterday said he was continuing with his experiment to develop what he described as an “atomic bomb” that he hoped would have a big influence on Taiwanese politics.
Ko made the remarks on the sidelines of a rally for TPP legislative candidates in front of the Taipei Election Commission. He had taken a couple of hours off from his mayoral duties to show his support for the party’s nominees on the first day of registration for legislative candidates.
He first arrived at the headquarters of an online live broadcasting platform in Taipei to promote the TPP candidates, before joining those running for seats in Taipei.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
They chanted slogans in front of the city commission: “Push the pan-blue and pan-green camps to the side and put the people back in the center” and “Let Taiwan reboot and the Legislative Yuan have new opportunities.”
“Innovation is the only path for Taiwan,” Ko said, adding that as a smaller party with less resources, the TPP has to find new ways to promote itself, such as soliciting votes through new media platforms.
No matter how difficult it might be for TPP candidates to secure seats in the Jan. 11 elections, he has often encouraged them to do their best and go on bravely forward, Ko said.
He added that he was continuing with his experiment to develop an “atomic bomb” — signifying his intent to make a big difference to local politics.
Asked whether the TPP has decided on its list of legislators-at-large, Ko said the party plans to register them tomorrow — before the Friday deadline.
Asked about reports that the announcement has been delayed because potential nominee Cynthia Wu (吳欣盈), deputy chief executive of Shin Kong Life Insurance Co and granddaughter of Shin Kong Group founder Wu Ho-su (吳火獅), was having difficulty persuading her family about her plan to become a politician, Ko said: “Everyone will know [who is on the list] on Wednesday morning.”
Although Taiwan is a free and democratic country, it still lags behind democratic states such as Sweden and Switzerland, as many Taiwanese businesspeople are hesitant about openly funding political parties and would rather donate cash without getting a receipt, he said.
Ko reiterated that the TPP’s goal is not to attract large cash donations, but to raise campaign funds through online platforms.
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
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
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