Taipei Deputy Mayor Chen Chin-jun’s (陳景峻) comment about respecting Farglory Group chairman Chao Teng-hsiung (趙藤雄) is a backhanded compliment, Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) said yesterday, reiterating that his administration would ensure that the Taipei Dome is handled in a transparent and lawful manner.
Chen on Wednesday said that he respected Chao for his determination to complete the controversial build-operate-transfer project.
Ko fielded reporters’ questions about Chen’s remarks on the sidelines of a ceremony awarding military conscripts.
“I personally do not find him [Chao] respectable. If the Dome is to be built, it will be built according to safety standards,” Ko said.
The project would be approached legally and within reason, with public safety being the overarching principle, he added.
Asked to elaborate on his remark that he does not respect Chao and whether Chen’s remarks were representative of the city government, Ko said: “I think he [Chen] was being sarcastic.”
“What is there about him [Chao] to respect? Give me a break,” he said, urging reporters not to take Chen’s remarks seriously.
Asked if the Dome project could affect his showing in polls, Ko said that no matter what the impact on his approval ratings, he would do whatever is right.
“Up until now, we have not made concessions as my predecessors had,” the mayor said.
As for the sarcastic criticism from the Songshan Tobacco Factory Tree Protection Union — which dubbed Ko “Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) 2.0” after his predecessor because he has not ordered the Dome be demolished — Ko said that it would have been difficult to follow through on the option.
“There has to be some degree of continuity in politicians’ decisionmaking,” he said.
If the Dome were to be torn down, it would need to be done according to the law, he said.
“Taiwan is not like Shanghai or Singapore, and I am not Hitler. I cannot do as I please,” he said.
In other news, the Taipei Animal Protection Office yesterday defended itself against accusations that it has been concealing cases of the H5N2 strain of avian influenza.
The Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine last week said that three outbreaks of the bird flu were identified in Taipei last year and this year, but the office said in a news release on Thursday last week that “no symptoms of avian influenza have been detected so far.”
It was not until the following day that the office published a case of H5N2 infection, the bureau said.
The office yesterday said that it had reported all three cases — including two cases of the H5N8 and one of the H5N2 subtypes — and the media had covered the incidents.
Its news release last week referred to the absence of bird flu cases among 3,021 samples collected last year from 85 locations, where it has been “proactively monitoring” viruses, the office said.
Additional reporting by Nieh Wei-ling
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