Incumbent Tainan City Mayor Hsu Tain-tsair (許添財) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ended weeks of speculation yesterday by announcing he will not run in the year-end mayoral race in Tainan.
His decision came one month after he said he was considering an independent bid for the seat, having lost the nomination in the May DPP primaries to Legislator William Lai (賴清德).
Hsu held off on the decision until yesterday as speculation mounted that he would take the same route as Kaohsiung County Commissioner Yang Chiu-hsing (楊秋興), who broke away from the DPP earlier last month to run as an independent candidate for mayor of the southern municipality that will be a merger of Kaohsiung city and county.
At a press conference two hours before the 5pm deadline on the last day for candidacy registration for the Nov. 27 special municipal elections, Hsu said he had decided not to run in the race because “the need to do so does not exist.”
However, he said that the DPP primary had damaged his reputation and he suggested the party conduct an across-the-board review after the November election is over.
DPP Chairperson, Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), who tried to dissuade Hsu when he first said he was considering an independent run, said earlier that she believes Hsu is “someone who would take the whole situation into account.”
With Hsu out of the reckoning, the race for the Greater Tainan area — a merger of Tainan city and county — will be between Lai and Kuo Tien-Tsai (郭添財) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT).
Both Lai and Kuo completed their candidacy registrations on Monday, the first day of the five-day registration period.
A draw will be held by the Central Election Commission on Oct. 29 to determine the candidates’ ballot numbers.
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