The Central Election Commission (CEC) yesterday reminded the public that no campaigning is allowed after midnight, with offenders subject to a fine of up to NT$5 million (US$161,786).
A day before voters were set to cast ballots for the heads of cities and counties and other local offices, CEC Chairman Lee Chin-yung (李進勇) told a news conference in Taipei that all “public campaigning activities,” such as open rallies, had to end by 10pm yesterday.
No election activities — public or private — would be allowed after midnight, and violators would face fines ranging from NT$500,000 to NT$5 million, Lee said.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
Given the popularity of social media, CEC Deputy Chairman Chen Chao-chien (陳朝建) reminded people that they are prohibited from displaying on social media profile pictures that deliver an election message after midnight.
Those who do could also be fined up to NT$5 million, Chen said.
In addition to the local elections, voters are to cast their ballots in a referendum to lower the voting age to 18 from 20.
Lee said that anybody other than candidates in the elections would still be allowed to post messages supporting their positions on the referendum today, but information on a candidate cannot be used in any messages on the referendum.
More than 11,000 positions at all levels of local governments will be up for grabs today.
Those eligible to vote can cast ballots from 8am to 4pm. The CEC did not say when the results of the different races would come out, but Lee said the commission would try its best to complete the vote count by the end of today.
There will be 17,649 polling stations across the nation staffed by more than 300,000 election workers to ensure a smooth voting process and the quick counting of ballots, Lee said.
Voters are not allowed to take ballots out of the polling stations or they will face a jail term of up to one year or a fine of up to NT$15,000, Lee said.
A total of 19.13 million Taiwanese are eligible to vote in the elections, including 760,000 first-time voters, while a total of 19.24 million can vote in the referendum, the CEC said.
However, those who tested positive for COVID-19 from Monday onward are not allowed to vote, as they have to isolate for five days.
At a separate news conference, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) estimated that about 65,000 citizens with COVID-19 would not be able to exercise their right to vote due to the five-day isolation mandate.
Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝), head of the CECC, said that while more than 66,000 cases had been reported from Tuesday to yesterday, an estimated 10,000 more cases reported today would bring the total to 80,000 people who would be undergoing five-day isolation on election day.
As about 80 percent of these people have the right to vote, that means about 65,000 would be unable to cast their ballots, Wang said.
Asked if there would be many hidden cases who did not report their condition in order to vote, Wang dispelled the concern, saying that the total number of infections this week is expected to be between 105,000 and 110,000, which is in line with the declining trend so far.
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
RSS