A coalition of pro-Taiwanese independence and localization parties, led by the 908 Taiwan Republic Campaign, yesterday appealed for voter support nationwide as their members marched through downtown Taipei in a final show of force ahead of Saturday’s presidential and legislative elections.
Members of the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU), the Taiwan Action Party Alliance (TAPA), which hope to secure enough party votes to get some of their legislator-at-large nominees into the legislature, and the Free Taiwan Party also took part in the march, which started in the afternoon with a rally in front of the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) headquarters in Taipei.
Yesterday’s march was aimed at consolidating the pro-Taiwan forces to fight against the “parties and candidates backed by China, who are selling out the Taiwanese to Beijing” and to “Oust Wu Sz-huai (吳斯懷),” a retired army lieutenant general on the Chinese Nationalist Part’s (KMT) legislator-at-large list, 908 Taiwan Republic Campaign convener Peter Wang (王獻極) said.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
Wu, who receives a generous pension from government as a retired general, was a top guest at a Chinese People’s Liberation Army military review, attended a key meeting at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People and listened to an address by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), Wang said.
“We call on all voters to reject KMT presidential candidate Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) and not to vote for all of the ‘pro-China parties’ in this election, including the KMT, the People First Party (PFP), the New Party and the Taiwan People’s Party,” he said.
Free Taiwan Party founder Tsay Ting-kuei (蔡丁貴) said “the best way to safeguard Taiwan is for people to vote for pro-Taiwan parties, so these can have a good representation in the Legislative Yuan and push for the establishment of an independent Taiwan nation.”
While there were just a few hundred people at the start of the rally, organizers said more than 1,000 people joined the march by the end, along with motorcades of cars and bicycle carts from small parties and pro-Taiwan groups that had earlier taken part in rallies in other locations.
By late afternoon, the participants reached the 228 Memorial Park and then headed to the Taipei Guest House to pay tribute to former chief of the General Staff, General Shen Yi-ming (沈一鳴), and seven other officers who died on Thursday after a military helicopter crashed in the mountains of New Taipei City.
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