Tue, Aug 19, 2014 page3

• INTERVIEW: ‘Jason Hu’s biggest enemy is himself’: Lin Chia-lung

  • By Tang Tsai-hsin and Jason Pan / Staff reporter with staff writer
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  “Greater Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) has been at the job for 13 years, but one cannot see evidence of his accomplishments,” Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Greater Taichung mayoral candidate Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) told the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) in a recent interview.

  The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) incumbent has been given three chances to achieve something over his three terms as mayor, but has nothing to show for them, the 50-year-old Lin added.

  “Despite being in charge for 13 years, Hu has failed to establish an MRT system for the city, nor has he been able to build the domed stadium and ‘circum-Greater Taichung rail line’ [patterned after Tokyo’s JR Yamanote Line] that he promised,” Lin said. “I have prepared for this job for 10 years. What Hu is unable to do, let Lin Chia-lung do.”

  Since securing the DPP’s nomination for the Greater Taichung race, Lin has held a double-digit lead over Hu in public opinion polls, which he said indicates local residents’ desire for change. Lin said that to fulfill this desire, if elected, he would aim to attract talent from diverse fields that would enabled him to be “a mayor for all.”

  Lin said it is hard to believe that he entered the then-Taichung City mayoral race 10 years ago and is back a decade later to contest the seat again with the same person.

  “Even more unbelievable is that in the campaign 10 years ago, it was I who proposed the ‘circum-Taichung rail line.’ At the time, Hu and his camp ridiculed me for my proposal. Now, a decade later, the project has become part of Hu’s re-election platform,” Lin said.

  Lin said that he was the one who had originally called for building a railway linking Houli (后里) to Dajia (大甲), two of the main stations on the Taiwan Railways Administration’s Mountain Line and Sea Line respectively, to anchor the proposed circular rail network.

  “However, Lin Liang-tai (林良泰), Hu’s transportation bureau chief at the time, mocked my proposal at a Taichung City Council meeting, saying it was akin to a child’s sketch drawing: good only for pinning to a wall,” Lin Chia-lung said.

  “If Hu had begun the project 10 years ago instead of ridiculing the plan, it would have been completed by now,” he added.

  The DPP contender said Hu had promised to build an international convention center in the city’s No. 7 Municipal Sector, adding that “now, 10 years later, this project — now called the ‘Maple Garden’ (秋紅谷) — is still tied up in the courts with lawsuits.”

  “The site designated for the project is ‘full of gold’ as it is a valuable real-estate tract. However, Hu has turned it into a big pond after the developer got tied up in litigation and construction on the convention center was halted after only the digging for the building’s foundation had been completed. So after one decade, the public only have the Maple Garden park with a pond on this piece of promising real estate. Yet Hu trumpets this as though it was a successful achievement of his administration,” Lin Chia-lung said.

  After 13 years, Greater Taichung still does not have an MRT network, a domed stadium, an international convention center nor a popular music culture center, the absences of which runs contrary to what the mayor had promised, he added.

  It is the same story with the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT), since “before the last election, Hu promised Greater Taichung an MRT network, but after the race, the plan morphed into a rapid transit system for buses,” the DPP candidate said.

  Lin Chia-lung said Hu should face voters to apologize for this “bounced checks” and not try to delude people by saying that the “BRT was the best possible option.”

  “Jason Hu’s biggest enemy is himself. He is good at weaving dreams. Hu is an outstanding ‘dreamweaver,’ but the bigger the dream is, the bigger the holes poking through it are,” Lin Chia-lung said. “After 13 years, it is not possible for him to get Greater Taichung residents to believe in a new dream.”

  Lin Chia-lung said his rival is making a big error in thinking that Greater Taichung residents are inextricably linked to him.

  “Hu is always boasting that Greater Taichung is so good in every way. However, many citizens are exasperated at this stance because, if it were is true, why has Hu let the city’s core be hollowed out and the old Taichung county districts marginalized?” he asked.

  Lin Chia-lung said he worked hard to devise plans to develop the municipality properly over the course of more than 10 years, but never got the chance to realize them.

  “Having held the job for 13 years, Hu has already done all he is capable of. What he has been unable to do so far, he will not be able to achieve in the future,” Lin Chia-lung said. “Greater Taichung has the potential to be a nice flower garden, but it is currently dilapidated. The time is ripe to replace the head gardener.”
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