Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman and presidential candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) yesterday said that pan-green camp politicians would not be excluded from his coalition government if he is elected.
Ko was responding to an appeal by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) vice presidential candidate and Broadcasting Corp of China chairman Jaw Shaw-kong (趙少康) to renounce all cooperation with the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) if he becomes president.
KMT presidential candidate Hou You-yi’s (侯友宜) campaign urged Ko to vow to never form a coalition with the DPP in the Legislative Yuan or appoint its members.
Photo: CNA
“I do not understand this logic behind their excluding everyone else from government as soon as they get power,” Ko told reporters on the sidelines of door-to-door campaign in New Taipei City.
In response to a request to comment on a new KMT ad saying that a vote for Hou is a vote for Ko, he said that “voting for me straight-up will do. There is no need to do it in a roundabout way.”
Regarding former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) comment that Taiwan must trust Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in cross-strait affairs and reduce military spending, Ko said that he supports raising defense-related expenditures to 3 percent of the nation’s GDP.
Photo: CNA
Taiwan must be confident in the strength of its self-defense capabilities and have solid relations with its friends and allies before attempting to enter into dialogue with Beijing, he said.
“Nobody gets into this kind of thing by trusting the other side from the very beginning,” he added.
Separately, DPP spokesman Chang Chih-hao (張志豪) yesterday called a statement from Ko campaign’s policy on indigenous people “arrogant and ignorant,” adding that the candidate has a history of discrimination against women and less-fortunate people.
A report from the independent news outlet wuo-wuo.com cited the Ko campaign as saying the candidate would protect endangered species by “educating indigenous people to change their religion and hunting lifestyle.”
Chang said Ko has shown a lack of respect for indigenous cultures on many occasions and accused indigenous Taiwanese of “whining about nothing” at last year’s Indigenous Youth Forum.
TPP Legislator Cynthia Wu (吳欣盈), Ko’s running mate, was seen smiling and nodding when a supporter complained that there were too many indigenous people in Hualien and that the supporter was scared of them, he said.
“Ko’s consistent arrogance and ignorance revealed that he does not have the temperament and character to be a presidential candidate,” Chang said.
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
Another wave of cold air would affect Taiwan starting from Friday and could evolve into a continental cold mass, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Temperatures could drop below 10°C across Taiwan on Monday and Tuesday next week, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. Seasonal northeasterly winds could bring rain, he said. Meanwhile, due to the continental cold mass and radiative cooling, it would be cold in northern and northeastern Taiwan today and tomorrow, according to the CWA. From last night to this morning, temperatures could drop below 10°C in northern Taiwan, it said. A thin coat of snow
RSS