The campaign office of Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman and presidential candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) yesterday accused television news channels of being associated with either the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) or Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), and that they have become a weapon to attack political rivals.
Showing a statistics table complied during prime time (8pm to 10pm) from Wednesday to Friday last week, TPP legislator at-large candidate Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) said that EBC News promoted KMT presidential candidate New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) and his running mate, Jaw Shaw-kong (趙少康), the most, and hardly even mentioned Ko or his running mate, Cynthia Wu (吳欣盈).
In those three days, EBC News broadcast eight positive stories on the Hou-Jaw ticket, three stories — two positive and one negative — on DPP presidential candidate Vice President William Lai (賴清德) and his running mate, Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴), and only one negative story about the Ko-Wu team, the table showed.
Photo: Huang Tzu-yang, Taipei Times
EBC News on Wednesday even ran a story directly praising Hou and spent 2 minutes, 45 seconds reporting about him, while there were no stories at all about Ko, Huang said.
He also said that SET News (三立新聞) has become an attacker for the DPP, with the table showing that on Thursday and Friday last week the news channel broadcast 21 stories — 13 negative and eight neutral — on the Hou-Jaw ticket, 16 stories — 13 positive and three neutral — on the Lai-Hsiao ticket, and only six stories — two positive, two negative and two neutral — about the Ko-Wu ticket.
On Friday, SET News spent 22 minutes, 31 seconds reporting on negative news about the DPP’s political rivals, Huang said.
He said that the channels have breached Article 46 of the Presidential and Vice Presidential Election and Recall Act (總統副總統選舉罷免法) — which stipulates that TV channels should treat all the candidates in a fair and just manner.
TPP legislator-at-large candidate Vivian Huang (黃珊珊), Ko’s campaign manager, said many news stories about the TPP had been blocked by the media outlet’s editors.
The TPP ran a crowdfunding campaign to run an ad on EBC News, but was told that the advertising agency on Nov. 8 last year received a call from the TV station saying that its management had instructed it not to accept it, she said.
She also said that property developer Chang Kao-hsiang (張高祥), the owner of EBC News, had in March last year offered her three options — to become Hou’s running mate, run in the New Taipei City mayoral by-election if Hou steps down or become a minister.
EBC News said it would not respond to false accusations.
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