Hsinchu Mayor Lin Chih-chien (林智堅) yesterday accepted the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) nomination to run for Taoyuan mayor in the Nov. 26 local elections, saying he is ready to renew the party’s administration of the city.
His announcement came a day after the DPP’s Central Executive Committee approved a proposal from the election strategy committee to nominate Lin without holding a primary.
Taoyuan Mayor Cheng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) of the DPP cannot seek re-election, as he has reached the two-term limit.
Photo: Hung Mei-hsiu, Taipei Times
Lin told a news conference that the “fair city of Taoyuan cannot go backward” and that he is ready to pick up Chen’s mantle.
He attended the conference via video link, as he is undergoing COVID-19 quarantine.
The election would not be a race between the pan-green and pan-blue camps, but a fight to defend progress, he said.
Lin and Chen became mayors in 2014 after capturing cities deemed Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) strongholds and then won re-election.
Lin said he would seek counsel from DPP leaders and voters while canvassing Taoyuan’s 13 districts.
His election campaign would be carried out in cooperation with the party’s city council candidates in a bid to secure all of the council seats in the city, he said.
Lin said that DPP Legislator Cheng Yun-peng (鄭運鵬), and former legislators Cheng Pao-ching (鄭寶清), Huang Shih-cho (黃適卓), Huang Shier-chieg (黃世傑) and Peng Shao-chin (彭紹瑾) would support his candidacy.
Lin said his administration in Hsinchu has transformed the municipality into something more than a pass-through city.
Asked about his support for creating a special municipality by merging the Hsinchu city and county in addition to Taoyuan, Lin said that the opposition has torpedoed the proposal for the time being, but he would continue to support it.
The three jurisdictions should be integrated into an administrative region, as they already form a metropolitan area in practice, he said.
Lin said he looks forward to working with the next Hsinchu mayor to make the proposal a reality.
Lin said that his wife, Liao Yu-Shen (廖欲伸), has misgivings about his candidacy out of concern for his health and worries about KMT smear campaigns.
Liao remains firmly committed to the family’s political ideals despite these fears, he said.
Taiwan does not exclude the possibility of having formal diplomatic relations with countries that also have formal ties with China, regardless of Beijing’s stance, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Sunday. There was speculation in 2012 that Honduras was attempting to have simultaneous diplomatic relations with Taiwan and China, an idea that then-minister of foreign affairs David Lin (林永樂) rejected. Honduras severed formal ties with Taiwan on Sunday morning after establishing diplomatic relations with Beijing. President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration has taken a more practical approach to relations with like-minded countries since assuming government in 2016. Previous administrations took the
Seven senior faculty members, including the principal, of a high school in Taichung were temporarily suspended from their jobs on Friday, pending an investigation by the Taichung Education Bureau into alleged bullying and abuse that led to the suicide of a student last month. The city’s education officials were too slow to suspend those involved, the student’s father told a news conference on Wednesday, at which Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chang Liao Wan-chien (張廖萬堅) and members of the Humanistic Education Foundation were also present. The boy had been a good student and a high achiever during elementary and junior-high, and had
Taiwan would have established formal relations with Argentina long ago if not for China’s interference, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Alexander Yui told US-based Spanish-language online news outlet Infobae in an interview published on Tuesday. Beijing has left behind a string of unfulfilled promises in Latin America, including pledges to build the Grand Nicaragua Canal and airports, docks, ports and industrial zones in El Salvador, he said. Meanwhile, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Mexico and other countries enjoy pragmatic and improving relations with Taiwan based on cooperation on the economy, culture, technology and science, he said. While Taiwan is “happy to live and let live,”
WASHED ASHORE: Of the 16 bodies discovered along Taiwan’s west coast this month, two were Vietnamese and five were Taiwanese, coast guard officials said Minister of Justice Tsai Ching-hsiang (蔡清祥) said that he has instructed prosecutors and maritime authorities to launch investigations after 16 bodies were found along Taiwan’s west coast this month, amid speculation that they were victims of smuggling or human trafficking rings. Coast Guard Administration (CGA) officials said the bodies, most of which had washed ashore, were found by coast guard personnel and local residents along the coastline from Keelung to Kaohsiung. Thirteen of the bodies are male and three are female, the CGA said, adding that items found on the bodies indicate that two of the men were Vietnamese, while three men
RSS