A Taipei city councilor and a politician from the pan-green camp yesterday criticized Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) for expressing support for CTiTV News, which lost its operating license last year after a series of violations.
The channel has since moved its programming to YouTube.
Taipei City Councilor Miao Po-ya (苗博雅) of the Social Democratic Party said that she over the weekend received an online link to a video and had her office team authenticate it.
Photo courtesy of Taipei City Government
In the video Ko says: “CTiTV News has turned into Taiwan’s biggest news YouTuber, in keeping up the work to scrutinize the government, reporting on the pulse of society and giving voice to the common people.”
“You can change the network’s TV channel, but there is no concession on news media’s professionalism and its soul,” Ko says as the video cuts to a CTiTV news program, making it seem like an endorsement from the mayor.
Miao yesterday said Ko has once again reversed his stance, as he had said during a number of news controversies in 2019 that “when Taiwan has such media [CTiTV], who needs enemies?”
After verifying the video as genuine, Miao posted it on social media, where it circulated widely, leading many people to say Ko has shown his true colors “in support of red [Chinese] media.”
CTiTV News is considered to have a pro-China stance.
An Internet user addressed members of Ko’s Taiwan People’s Party: “This man has changed his political stances so many times, why do you still support him?”
The pro-independence Taiwan Statebuilding Party yesterday said that Ko has ambitions to run for president and is courting voters from Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and other pan-blue camp parties.
“Just last month, when asked about political figures using their special privilege to get vaccine shots at Taipei clinics, Ko said that Taiwan will not have peace unless it gets rid of all political talk shows. However, he now endorses CTiTV,” Taiwan Statebuilding Party official Chang Po-yang (張博洋) said.
CTiTV News was repeatedly found to have fabricated news reports and spread rumors, Chang said, giving as an example the false report in 2019 that 2 million tonnes of pomeloes had been dumped into the Tzengwen Reservoir (曾文水庫) in Tainan.
The report insinuated that the Tainan City Government had been negligent in its duties and had not been caring for local farmers. The report came during a legislative election campaign as the KMT vied for control of the local government.
Chang said this is a well-known piece of fabricated news originating from a CTiTV political talk show.
The National Communications Commission later ruled that the report was fabricated news and fined the channel NT$1 million (US$35,823 at the current exchange rate), he added.
“This news network was one of the main sources causing disturbance in Taiwanese society. Now Ko is fully endorsing it. Does this not mean Ko is supporting the spreading of rumors and fake news ?” Chang said.
“Through the years, we have seen very clear that Ko plays politics for his own interests,” he said.
“What is Ko’s core value? The answer is that he would support anything that can cause harm to Taiwan. Ko has no limit as to what he is willing to do,” Chang said, citing Ko’s remark that “the two sides of the [Taiwan] Strait are one family,” his “vilification” of the government’s efforts to obtain vaccines and trying to sabotage Taiwan-US relations.
Tropical Storm Nari is not a threat to Taiwan, based on its positioning and trajectory, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Nari has strengthened from a tropical depression that was positioned south of Japan, it said. The eye of the storm is about 2,100km east of Taipei, with a north-northeast trajectory moving toward the eastern seaboard of Japan, CWA data showed. Based on its current path, the storm would not affect Taiwan, the agency said.
The Taipei Department of Health’s latest inspection of fresh fruit and vegetables sold in local markets revealed a 25 percent failure rate, with most contraventions involving excessive pesticide residues, while two durians were also found to contain heavy metal cadmium at levels exceeding safety limits. Health Food and Drug Division Director Lin Kuan-chen (林冠蓁) yesterday said the agency routinely conducts inspections of fresh produce sold at traditional markets, supermarkets, hypermarkets, retail outlets and restaurants, testing for pesticide residues and other harmful substances. In its most recent inspection, conducted in May, the department randomly collected 52 samples from various locations, with testing showing
Taipei and other northern cities are to host air-raid drills from 1:30pm to 2pm tomorrow as part of urban resilience drills held alongside the Han Kuang exercises, Taiwan’s largest annual military exercises. Taipei, New Taipei City, Keelung, Taoyuan, Yilan County, Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County are to hold the annual Wanan air defense exercise tomorrow, following similar drills held in central and southern Taiwan yesterday and today respectively. The Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) and Maokong Gondola are to run as usual, although stations and passenger parking lots would have an “entry only, no exit” policy once air raid sirens sound, Taipei
Taiwan is bracing for a political shake-up as a majority of directly elected lawmakers from the main opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) face the prospect of early removal from office in an unprecedented wave of recall votes slated for July 26 and Aug. 23. The outcome of the public votes targeting 26 KMT lawmakers in the next two months — and potentially five more at later dates — could upend the power structure in the legislature, where the KMT and the smaller Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) currently hold a combined majority. After denying direct involvement in the recall campaigns for months, the
RSS