A by-election is to be held on March 4 to fill the legislative seat vacated by Hsu Shu-hua (許淑華) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), who was inaugurated as Nantou County commissioner on Sunday, the Central Election Commission (CEC) said on Sunday.
Under the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法), an election must be held within three months of a legislative seat becoming vacant, the CEC said in a statement.
Voting in the March 4 by-election is to start at 8am and end at 4pm, the CEC said.
Photo: Liu Pin-chuan, Taipei Times
The by-election is to be officially announced today, and candidate registration is scheduled to take place from Jan. 9 to 13, it said.
Candidates for the race being speculated on by local media include Nantou County chapter head Lin Ru-bin (林儒彬), Nantou Mayor Song Huai-lin (宋懷琳) and Nantou County Councilor Yu Hao (游顥), all from the KMT.
Also being reported are Jiji Township (集集) Mayor Chen Ji-heng (陳紀衡) and Nantou County Councilor Lai Yen-hsueh (賴燕雪) from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), media reports have said.
The DPP has also reportedly encouraged Tsai Pei-hui (蔡培慧), who lost to Hsu in the commissioner election on Nov. 26, to run in the legislative by-election.
Also sworn in as local leaders on Sunday were two other legislators: Chou Chun-mi (周春米) of the DPP as Pingtung County commissioner and Ann Kao (高虹安) of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) as Hsinchu mayor.
However, as both Chou and Kao were legislators-at-large — meaning that they were elected on a separate ballot in which voters choose their preferred political party, rather than individual candidates tied to electoral districts — their seats can be filled by their parties.
Chou’s seat has been filled by Chen Ching-min (陳靜敏), who previously served as a DPP lawmaker, while Kao’s was filled by TPP legislative caucus office director Chen Wan-hui (陳琬惠), the CEC said.
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
NUMBERS IMBALANCE: More than 4 million Taiwanese have visited China this year, while only about half a million Chinese have visited here Beijing has yet to respond to Taiwan’s requests for negotiation over matters related to the recovery of cross-strait tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. Taiwan’s tourism authority issued the statement after Chinese-language daily the China Times reported yesterday that the government’s policy of banning group tours to China does not stop Taiwanese from visiting the country. As of October, more than 4.2 million had traveled to China this year, exceeding last year. Beijing estimated the number of Taiwanese tourists in China could reach 4.5 million this year. By contrast, only 500,000 Chinese tourists are expected in Taiwan, the report said. The report