Former Chiayi mayor Huang Min-hui (黃敏惠) yesterday announced her bid to run in the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) primary for the city mayorship in the upcoming nine-in-one local elections.
Huang, who served as the city’s mayor for two terms from 2005 to 2014, made the announcement during a morning party in the city.
“Many good friends have told me that they wanted to see Chiayi return to its former glory,” Huang said on the sidelines of the event.
Photo: CNA
“I have decided to join their efforts by throwing my hat in the ring,” she added.
Having invested significant time and effort in listening to those at the grassroots level, Huang said she has the best grasp of people’s opinions and needs.
However, as a KMT member, Huang said she would respect the party leadership’s final decision.
Huang became the first woman in the KMT to take over the party’s helm in January 2016, when she was appointed interim party chairwoman after then-KMT chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) stepped down to take political responsibility for the KMT’s disastrous defeat in the presidential and legislative elections that year.
Huang only headed the party for two months before yielding the position to former deputy legislative speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) in March 2016, after losing to her in a party leadership by-election.
Interest in joining the KMT primary for the Chiayi mayoral post has also been expressed by two others: Chiayi City Council Speaker Hsiao Shu-li (蕭淑麗) and Jack Lee (李允傑), former minister of the now-defunct National Youth Commission.
The Chiayi position is currently held by Mayor Twu Shiing-jer (涂醒哲), a doctor-turned-politician and member of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), who defeated KMT candidate Chen Yi-chen (陳以真) by only 8,590 votes in the 2014 local elections.
During yesterday’s event, KMT Chairman Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) said all three aspirants were talented and capable politicians.
“The KMT will choose Chiayi residents’ most preferred candidate through public opinion polls and a fair, just and open mechanism,” Wu said, expressing the hope that a KMT victory in the upcoming Chiayi mayoral election could pave the way for the party’s return to power in 2020.
The nine-in-one elections are scheduled for Nov. 24, when voters are to choose the mayors and city councilors of the six special municipalities, mayors and councilors in other cities, Aboriginal district representatives and councilors, county commissioners and councilors, township mayors and councilors, and borough and village wardens.
Meanwhile, in an attempt to prevent the DPP from losing Chiayi, the party’s headquarters is strongly promoting Twu, touting his political achievements to gain the support of county residents.
However, a source within the party said that an inability to “bring people together” is still Twu’s greatest challenge.
Additional reporting by Su Fang-ho
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
CHANGING LANDSCAPE: Many of the part-time programs for educators were no longer needed, as many teachers obtain a graduate degree before joining the workforce, experts said Taiwanese universities this year canceled 86 programs, Ministry of Education data showed, with educators attributing the closures to the nation’s low birthrate as well as shifting trends. Fifty-three of the shuttered programs were part-time postgraduate degree programs, about 62 percent of the total, the most in the past five years, the data showed. National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) discontinued the most part-time master’s programs, at 16: chemistry, life science, earth science, physics, fine arts, music, special education, health promotion and health education, educational psychology and counseling, education, design, Chinese as a second language, library and information sciences, mechatronics engineering, history, physical education
RSS