Former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) yesterday said that he has not ruled out joining the legislative race “if it is helpful for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT).”
Meanwhile, his confirmation of the party’s intention to enlist pop star Selina Jen’s (任家萱) husband, Richard Chang (張承中), as a legislative candidate turned out to be a damp squib, as Chang declined.
Hau said that next year’s presidential and legislative elections would be a tough fight for the KMT and that the party is considering a range of possible strategies.
“I’ve been advised a lot, including on how to support other candidates or on becoming a legislative candidate myself in Taichung, Tainan, Kaohsiung or Keelung. I don’t mind joining the race, but it needs comprehensive consideration. Provided that it would be beneficial to the party as a whole, I would seriously consider the possibility,” Hau said.
Regarding the KMT’s reported plan to field Chang — who is also the son of former New Party legislator Chang Shih-liang (張世良) — as its legislative candidate in Taipei against Democratic Progressive Party incumbent Pasuya Yao (姚文智), Hau confirmed that the KMT approached Richard Chang about it, saying that his initial response was positive.
“[Richard Chang] is a loyal KMT member and we can be sure that he is not against running,” Hau said.
However, later yesterday, Richard Chang clarified on Facebook that he is not a KMT member and has no party affiliation, and that Hau is a long-time family friend.
“Becoming a candidate might be a chance to do good, but it is also a war detrimental to a person’s integrity,” he said. “I [said I] would consider the offer, as it means [the party leaders] have a good opinion of me.”
“However, I tend to be more reserved, seeing how it has developed. If I am drafted by [the KMT] in next week’s Central Standing Committee meeting, I could do nothing but kindly turn it down,” he said.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
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