Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Pasuya Yao (姚文智) yesterday pledged his unconditionally support to Taiwan University Hospital physician Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) in the Taipei mayoral election in November, after he lost to his independent rival on Friday in a public opinion poll to determine the pan-green camp’s final candidate for the contest.
Thanking his backers for their support, the lawmaker yesterday said he respects the results of the poll and would endeavor to help Ko win the election.
The party’s integration panel said the poll’s results are to be referred to the its Central Executive Committee meeting on Wednesday for a final decision.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
Ko is widely expected to represent the pan-green camp in the Taipei mayoral race in November and run against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate Sean Lien (連勝文) if the DPP decides not to nominate a candidate from its ranks.
Political observers say Ko must figure out how to maintain the straight-talking style that has seen him dominate opinion polls, while offering voters substance in terms of his policy ideas and political plans and all the while keeping his foot out of his mouth.
Ko’s spokesperson Chien Yu-yen (簡余晏) has said the mayoral hopeful will aim to “speak more cautiously in the future,” while bidding not to disappoint his assistants, who hope the novice politician will stay true to his character of “telling it like it is.”
However, Ko has shown no sign of toning down the penchant for sharp rhetoric that in May last year saw him declare: “This country has gone mad,” after receiving a summons from the Investigation Bureau’s Taipei office over allegations of corruption in one of his research projects.
Yet Ko will have to present more than biting criticism of the government to convince Taipei voters he is the right person to govern the city.
In an ironically comedic twist, Ko is partly responsible for his rival, Lien, being eligible to run against him because he helped debunk rumors that the KMT candidate staged a shooting and faked injuries to garner sympathy votes for KMT candidates on the eve of the 2010 municipal elections.
Lien was shot in the face while stumping for a New Taipei City councilor candidate at a public rally and it was Ko, as a specialist in emergency medicine at National Taiwan University Hospital, who led a team of physicians to operate on Lien after the shooting.
A TVBS poll conducted on the nights of June 5 and 6 gave Ko a 45 to 39 percent advantage in the race, the first time a public poll has not put Lien in front.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is maintaining close ties with Beijing, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, hours after a new round of Chinese military drills in the Taiwan Strait began. Political parties in a democracy have a responsibility to be loyal to the nation and defend its sovereignty, DPP spokesman Justin Wu (吳崢) told a news conference in Taipei. His comments came hours after Beijing announced via Chinese state media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command was holding large-scale drills simulating a multi-pronged attack on Taiwan. Contrary to the KMT’s claims that it is staunchly anti-communist, KMT Deputy
RSS