Kaohsiung residents in a recall vote yesterday overwhelmingly voted to remove Kaohsiung Mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) from office.
The result made Han the nation’s first special municipality head to be recalled, just a year-and-a-half after he won a surprise victory over a candidate from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which had run the city for two decades.
The vote was 939,090 in favor of recall and 25,051 against, with a 42.14 percent voter turnout, Kaohsiung City Election Commission data showed.
Photo: CNA
There are 2,299,981 eligible voters in the city, the data showed.
At least 25 percent of eligible voters — or 574,996 people — had to vote in favor of a recall and the number of people voting for it must exceed the number of those voting against for the recall motion to pass, according to Article 90 of the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法).
The 939,090 votes in favor of the recall was more than Han had garnered in November 2018’s mayoral election, when he won the four-candidate race with 892,545 votes, or 53.86 percent, in a traditional DPP stronghold.
Photo: CNA
The recall petition against Han began in June last year, after Han announced a presidential bid less than six months into his mayoral term.
The civic organizations that initiated the petition said that Han launching a presidential bid so soon after being elected mayor angered many Kaohsiung residents, who thought he was not prioritizing the city’s governance.
The recall campaign had strong backing from DPP politicians.
Photo: CNA
After the vote results yesterday, Han led city government officials in a news conference and took a bow thanking Kaohsiung residents for electing him in 2018.
He also expressed his gratitude to city government officials who worked with him.
However, he said he was sorry to see the DPP focusing all its attention on “endless slander” against him since the party won the presidential election in January.
Photo: Hsu Lee-chuan, Taipei Times
The mudslinging has hurt the city government, as the hard work of its officials has been reduced to nothing, Han said.
Noting that agricultural produce exports have increased and the city government’s disease prevention efforts topped the nation, he said it is regrettable he could no longer lead his administrative team to serve the city and keep his promises to build new roads, attract investments and take care of disadvantaged people.
“I hope future mayors will lead Kaohsiung toward prosperity, and I hope Kaohsiung will become a great, bright and wealthy city, “ he said.
Some Han supporters broke into tears upon learning that the recall vote had passed. Some called on him to run for KMT chairman and again for Kaohsiung mayor in 2024, while others said Han’s recall was the city’s loss.
Supporters of the Wecare Kaohsiung coalition, which organized the recall campaign, were ecstatic, chanting: “I [am a] Kaohsiung [resident], I [am] proud.”
Lead petition organizer Chen Kuan-jung (陳冠榮) called on Kaohsiung residents to put aside their differences and help heal the rift that has plagued the city since 2018.
“New life has come, the people of Kaohsiung, clap for yourselves,” Wecare spokesperson Lee Yi-chieh (李佾潔) said.
The time of conflict, hate and lies has come to an end, and the residents of Kaohsiung should, together, embark on a journey toward true freedom, Lee added.
“We have succeeded and we are aware of the imperfections of the law, but that is what we can work toward, to make the power of the people greater,” Lee said.
Taiwan Statebuilding Party member Chang Po-yang (張博洋) said that the people of Kaohsiung can only rejoice for one night, because tomorrow they have to start working to mend the schism between city residents.
Chang also called on recall supporters not to blame those who disagreed with the movement, as they have different ideas, but love Kaohsiung nonetheless.
Additional reporting by Huang Hsu-lei and Fang Chih-hsien
PRECISION STRIKES: The most significant reason to deploy HIMARS to outlying islands is to establish a ‘dead zone’ that the PLA would not dare enter, a source said A High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) would be deployed to Penghu County and Dongyin Island (東引) in Lienchiang County (Matsu) to force the Chinese military to retreat at least 100km from the coastline, a military source said yesterday. Taiwan has been procuring HIMARS and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) from the US in batches. Once all batches have been delivered, Taiwan would possess 111 HIMARS units and 504 ATACMS, which have a range of 300km. Considering that “offense is the best defense,” the military plans to forward-deploy the systems to outlying islands such as Penghu and Dongyin so that
WHAT WAS ALL THAT FOR? Jaw Shaw-kong said that Cheng Li-wen had pushed for more drastic cuts and attacked him, just for the outcome to be nearly identical to his bill The legislature yesterday passed a supplementary budget bill to fund the purchase of separate packages of US military equipment, with the combined amount of spending capped at NT$780 billion (US$24.8 billion). The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their legislative majority to pass the bill, which runs until 2033 and has two main funding provisions. One was for NT$300 billion of arms sales already approved by the US for Taiwan on Dec. 17 last year, the other was for NT$480 billion for another arms package expected to be announced by Washington. The bill, which fell short of the NT$1.25
‘CLEAR MESSAGE’: The bill would set up an interagency ‘tiger team’ to review sanctions tools and other economic options to help deter any Chinese aggression toward Taiwan US Representative Young Kim has introduced a bill to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, calling for an interagency “tiger team” to preplan coordinated sanctions and economic measures in response to possible Chinese military or political action against Taiwan. “[Chinese President] Xi Jinping [習近平] has directed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. China has a plan. America should have one too,” Kim said in a news release on Thursday last week. She introduced the “Deter PRC [People’s Republic of China] aggression against Taiwan act” to “ensure the US has a coordinated sanctions strategy ready should
A former television news host and six military personnel — active and retired — have been indicted on espionage charges, Kaohsiung prosecutors said yesterday. Lin Chen-you (林宸佑), a former CTi News host and YouTuber, last year allegedly made videos at the direction of a Chinese agent criticizing the Democratic Progressive Party’s recall campaign, the Ciaotou District Prosecutors’ Office told a news conference in Kaohsiung. He allegedly received 4,325 tether coins for the videos from an unidentified person surnamed Huang (黃), believed to be an agent of a hostile foreign power, they said. Lin, also known as Ma Te (馬德), has a show named
RSS