The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is aiming to have the least expensive presidential election campaign, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday, after the party was reported to have achieved little success in fundraising with KMT presidential candidate Hou You-yi (侯友宜) on the ballot.
“For the upcoming general election, we would set a new record for the least amount of campaign funds spent. What we are counting on is favors and friendships from the people. Our campaign staff members at different localities hold rallies by themselves without spending funds from campaign headquarters,” Chu told reporters on the sideline of a campaign event for the party’s legislative candidate Chang Szu-kang (張斯綱) in Taipei.
The party is to hold 17 campaign rallies nationwide from until the election day, Chu said.
Photo: Lin Hsin-han, Taipei Times
“The KMT does not have many resources, and Hou’s campaign headquarters would not raise funds and depend mainly on small donations from independent voters and grassroots support,” he said.
Chu said that the general election this year is “a choice between war and peace.”
“The Democratic Progressive Party [DPP] has ruled the country for almost eight years, during which the government has been plagued with scandals, corruption and injustice,” Chu said. “This is also a choice for honesty, fairness and justice. When Hou is elected, he would definitely resume the operation of the Special Investigation Division to address the injustice and build an honest government again.”
Chu also criticized Vice President and DPP presidential candidate William Lai (賴清德), saying that people should be concerned about Lai’s support for an independent Taiwan.
“No US government official or US think tank agrees with or supports Taiwan’s independence, and yet Lai is known for being the golden grandson of pro-independence activists and a pragmatic activist for Taiwan independence,” he said.
All articles published by US think tanks are about how a pro-Taiwan independence candidate would affect and harm the world situation. This is the question that people should seriously ponder,” Chu said.
Separately yesterday in response to media queries for comment regarding the KMT’s campaign fundraising, Taiwan’s People Party chairman and presidential candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) said he believed Chu for saying that KMT would spend the least amount of campaign funds compared with previous elections.
“They used to have more than NT$10 billion [US$317.7 million] at their disposal, but now they can only make do with just a few billion [new Taiwan dollars]. Of course, the campaign funds they can use are much less,” Ko said.
Additional reporting by CNA
Taiwan would benefit from more integrated military strategies and deployments if the US and its allies treat the East China Sea, the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea as a “single theater of operations,” a Taiwanese military expert said yesterday. Shen Ming-shih (沈明室), a researcher at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said he made the assessment after two Japanese military experts warned of emerging threats from China based on a drill conducted this month by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Eastern Theater Command. Japan Institute for National Fundamentals researcher Maki Nakagawa said the drill differed from the
A fugitive in a suspected cosmetic surgery fraud case today returned to Taiwan from Canada, after being wanted for six years. Internet celebrity Su Chen-tuan (蘇陳端), known as Lady Nai Nai (貴婦奈奈), and her former boyfriend, plastic surgeon Paul Huang (黃博健), allegedly defrauded clients and friends of about NT$1 billion (US$30.66 million). Su was put on a wanted list in 2019 when she lived in Toronto, Canada, after failing to respond to subpoenas and arrest warrants from the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office. Su arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport at 5am today on an EVA Air flight accompanied by a
A 79-year-old woman died today after being struck by a train at a level crossing in Taoyuan, police said. The woman, identified by her surname Wang (王), crossed the tracks even though the barriers were down in Jhongli District’s (中壢) Neili (內壢) area, the Taoyuan Branch of the Railway Police Bureau said. Surveillance footage showed that the railway barriers were lowered when Wang entered the crossing, but why she ventured onto the track remains under investigation, the police said. Police said they received a report of an incident at 6:41am involving local train No. 2133 that was heading from Keelung to Chiayi City. Investigators
The Keelung District Prosecutors’ Office today requested that a court detain three individuals, including Keelung Department of Civil Affairs Director Chang Yuan-hsiang (張淵翔), in connection with an investigation into forged signatures used in recall campaigns. Chang is suspected of accessing a household registration system to assist with recall campaigns targeting Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) city councilors Cheng Wen-ting (鄭文婷) and Jiho Chang (張之豪), prosecutors said. Prosecutors yesterday directed investigators to search six locations, including the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Keelung office and the residences of several recall campaign leaders. The recall campaign leaders, including Chi Wen-chuan (紀文荃), Yu Cheng-i (游正義) and Hsu Shao-yeh
RSS