Who would have thought that the mayoral election for the nation’s capital would produce such inexperienced and unexpected candidates?
The two leading candidates are making grand promises: The Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Sean Lien (連勝文) says he will build a Taipei with two centers by reviving the western part and upgrading the eastern part of the city, while independent candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) says he will relocate Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) and build 5,000 low-income apartments at the Air Force Command Headquarters’ old site on Renai Road.
These are interesting election promises, but they leave city residents in the cold.
The two candidates’ supporters are engaging in a war of words, continuing the old tradition of negative attacks and bringing nothing new to the table, which only serves to further alienate voters.
The contenders’ lack of experience may not be that important, but since they are candidates, they should ask city residents for advice on what they want and learn about their daily lives.
They should both get out of their air-conditioned offices and cars and learn how the general public goes about making a living in the scorching heat of everyday life.
They could ride a scooter down to Neihu Technology Park and take a look at how buses, cars, motorcycles and scooters vie for space in a dangerous dance on the narrow Ruiguang Road. This scene repeats itself every day, but it is not very often that a mayor shows concern for commuters’ problems, nor does anyone study how to solve the problem. This is the road we have, and we are stuck with it.
Summers in Taipei are unbearably hot. Perhaps the two candidates can afford to use air conditioners, but many Taipei residents do not because they want to save money. Why not be a bit more creative and promise to try to find ways of making Taipei summers a bit cooler?
There are more and more small parks in the city, and there are also more and more small piles of dog excrement, which often leads to quarrels between neighbors. How should all those pet owners who do not fulfill their responsibilities be controlled? These may be small issues, but these are the kinds of issues that people care about.
The Taipei mayoral election is a battle of quality of living, and there is no need to discuss national policy issues.
It is easy to make big promises, but difficult to follow through, so one suggestion to the two candidates would be that they should start looking at small, everyday trivialities and systematically propose solutions that concern everyone.
They should try to build on the foundation laid by the current mayor and aim to create an international healthy city — a WHO concept — where people can make a good life.
Based on Ko’s perspective as a doctor, he could emulate the European experience of promoting international healthy cities in finding ways to solve Taipei’s perennial quality of living problem.
Lien studied in New York, yet what Taipei residents need is not a financial wizard, but a strategy that will bring Taipei living standards to the next level. New York converted an old abandoned freight rail line into the High Line Park: Perhaps there are other such creative solutions — rather than dead-end office building-oriented urban renewal projects — that could help make Taipei a more beautiful place.
It is only by proposing substantial ideas that concern voters that they will become interested.
Ted Chiou is a professor in the Department of Social and Policy Sciences at Yuan Ze University.
Translated by Perry Svensson
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