‘BIG BROTHER’: Taoyuan’s mayor said that Cho Jung-tai, who has held numerous government posts and was a legislator, is well-regarded by the younger generation

Taipei Times
Date: Dec 15, 2018
By: Yang Chun-hui  /  Staff reporter

Executive Yuan Secretary-General Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday registered as a

candidate in the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairperson election after being nominated by a group of “middle generation” party members.

The group, led by Taoyuan Mayor Cheng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦), on Thursday put forward Cho’s name, saying that they would accompany him yesterday afternoon to register as a candidate at the DPP’s headquarters in Taipei.

Cho would be competing with former DPP secretary-general Michael You (游盈隆) and former Kaohsiung County deputy commissioner Kuo Tai-ling (郭泰麟) for leadership of the party.

The group that nominated Cho includes Hsinchu Mayor Lin Chih-chien (林智堅), Chiayi County commissioner-elect Weng Chang-liang (翁章梁), former legislator Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁), outgoing Taichung Mayor Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍), Tainan mayor-elect Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) and Pingtung County Commissioner Pan Men-an (潘孟安).

[FULL  STORY]

The News Lens
Date: 2018/12/13
By: Courtney Donovan Smith (石東文)

Who will the KMT run for president in 2020, Chairman Wu Den-yih, former Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng, or another challenger candidate?

Normally, the question of who the Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang, KMT) will run for president is a simple one: The party chair has historically been the presumptive nominee. Also under normal circumstances, a party chair whose party has just won an overwhelming sweep of elected offices across the country should be riding high.

And yet, KMT chairman Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) is weak and on the defensive. Wu is a loyal party man and one of the few native born Taiwanese largely trusted by the traditional dominant KMT “mainlander” families that decamped with the defeated Republic of China government to Taiwan after losing the Chinese Civil War in 1949. As a protege of former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), he was picked to be premier, and eventually joined Ma on the winning ticket as vice presidential candidate in 2012.

Following the blowout election in 2016 that saw the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) win the presidency and the legislature by a large margin, the KMT was demoralized and in serious trouble: Both the party and their top politicians were unpopular and the electorate appeared to have permanently rejected the KMT’s pro-Chinese identity politics by a large margin. Into this breach, the native Taiwanese Wu ran for party chairman in 2017, and defeated a bevy of “mainlander” candidates, taking just over half the vote, in spite of Wu not being very popular with the electorate.

One of those challengers was Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), a largely unknown former legislator of humble “mainlander” background, with known gangster and local political faction connections. Perhaps with an eye on getting him out of the way, Han was dispatched to Kaohsiung to run for mayor in this year’s election – a city so firmly in the DPP’s camp they had ruled it for 20 years straight. A largely pro-Taiwan identity city, the rank out-of-towner seemed an almost impossible long shot.    [FULL  STORY]

No one answers the door when police visit An Tso Sun’s home in Taipei

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/12/13
By: Keoni Everington, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — After being released by prosecutors on Tuesday night (Dec. 11), when police tried to make a follow up visit today to his home in Taipei, no one answered the door, reported China Times.

When Taiwanese terror suspect An Tso “Edward” Sun (孫安佐), returned to Taiwan from the U.S. on Tuesday evening, prosecutors ordered that Sun be restricted to his residence and not travel overseas. After completing over two hours of questioning at the Prosecutor’s Office that night, Sun was seen leaving in a sedan toward his home in Taipei’s Beitou District, where no one has been seen entering or leaving since.

The Beitou Precinct of the Taipei Police Department today dispatched officers to Sun’s Beitou residence at 4 p.m. this afternoon in hopes of establishing a communication channel with Sun and his celebrity parents Sun Peng (孫鵬) and Di Ying (狄鶯). However, after ringing the bell several times, no one answered the door and police were therefore not permitted to enter the home without a warrant.

After waiting for 10 minutes, and as media started to gather, police left the scene.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/12/13
By: Liu Shi-yi and Flor Wang 

Taipei, Dec. 13 (CNA) Incumbent Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) has retained his mayoral post, following a vote recount requested by the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) candidate, the Taipei District Court said Thursday.

The initial result of the recount by the court shows that Ko grabbed 580,663 votes, ahead of the KMT’s Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) with 577,096, a difference of 3,567 ballots in the close-run race.

Ting requested the recount the day after the Nov. 24 Taipei mayoral election, in which Ko won re-election by a razor-thin margin of just 0.23 percent.

According to Taiwan’s election laws, if the margin between the two candidates with the highest votes falls below 0.3 percent, a recount can be demanded by the losing
candidate.     [FULL  STORY]

‘NATIONAL GATEWAY’: An expansion of the West District Gateway Project would require the central government’s cooperation to accelerate urban renewal of the area

Taipei Times
Date: Dec 14, 2018
By: Shen Pei-yao and Sherry Hsiao  /  Staff reporter, with staff writer

The Taipei City Government yesterday called on the central government to support an

expansion of its West District Gateway Project during a closely watched meeting between President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲).

At about 2pm yesterday, Tsai and Ko met at the plaza of the historic North Gate (北門) in Taipei, where Taipei Deputy Mayor Charles Lin (林欽榮) briefed the president on improvements made to the surrounding area before the group went into the adjacent Taipei Post Office for further discussions.

Lin began by outlining some of the major accomplishments of the project during Ko’s first term as mayor, including the demolition of a ramp to Zhongxiao Bridge (忠孝橋); the resurfacing of the North Gate, which was partially obstructed from view by the ramp; the construction of the Taipei Travel Plaza (台北行旅廣場); and the relocation, preservation and reopening of the Mitsui Warehouse (三井倉庫).    [FULL  STORY]

Police seize NT$230 million worth of pot plants in eastern Taiwan’s Taitung City

Taiwan News 
Date: 2018/12/13
By: Keoni Everington, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Police raided the largest marijuana growing operation in Taiwan’s history in Taitung City earlier this month, including 794 cannabis plants, each of which grew to about 200 centimeters in height, and were valued at a market price of over NT$200 million, reported CNA.

The Taitung investigative team of the Coast Guard recently received a tip that the telltale smell of marijuana had been emanating from what was supposed to be a “betel leaf garden” under Fengyuan Bridge in Taitung City. Team members disguised themselves as farmers, surveilled the field, and noticed that the smell of the so-called “betel leaf plant”s was very similar to that of marijuana plants.

After searching for and tracking the growers, the Coast Guard set up a special team with the Taitung County Police Bureau and Gusheng Precinct of the Kaohsiung Police Department to investigate the marijuana growing operation and report their findings to the Taitung District Prosecutor’s Office. On Dec. 3, a team of 10 officers was mobilized to raid the field.    [FULL  STORY]

The real question is, which new strategies did China use ahead of the Nov. 24 polls, and to what extend were they successful?

The News Lens
Date: 2018/12/12
By: Chen Yu-hua

Taiwan completed its nine-in-one local election on Nov. 24, 2018, which ended up being a historical defeat of the ruling Democratic Progress Party (DPP). Before and after every election, Taiwanese officials and the general population question whether China would or did meddle in the process. However, this question is somewhat misleading, because China has been meddling in Taiwanese elections, if not everyday life, since the very beginning of Taiwanese democratization.

The very first Taiwanese presidential election was completed against the dire backdrop of multiple Chinese military exercises and missile tests around the waters of Taiwan from July 1995 to March 1996. Therefore, the real question is: did China’s meddling in the 2018 Taiwanese election use any new strategies, or transform into a different model? And, if so, was China successful?

Before and during the election, many were worried that China would try to replicate a so-called Russian model to meddle in the election. Generally speaking, people holding this concern referred to two specific events in which Russian behavior interfered in another country’s affairs: 1) the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014; and 2) the 2016 U.S. presidential election.    [FULL  STORY]

Magnitude 4.9 temblor rattles Taiwan’s Hualien County with intensity level 6 shock waves

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/12/12
By: Keoni Everington, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — A magnitude 4.9 earthquake rattled the eastern Taiwan County of Hualien at 9:24 p.m. tonight, according the Central Weather Bureau (CWB).

The epicenter of the quake was 13.3 kilometers southwest of Hualien County Hall, at a shallow depth of 12 kilometers.

The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, registered a 6 on Taiwan’s 7-tiered intensity scale in Hualien County, a 3 in Nantou County,
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/12/12
By: Yeh Su-ping and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, Dec. 12 (CNA) President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) will not sacrifice Taiwan’s

sovereignty and dignity for economic benefits while pursuing the policy of peaceful development of relations across the Taiwan Strait, Presidential Office Secretary-General Chen Chu (陳菊) said Wednesday at a legislative committee meeting.

Chen made the comment when asked by opposition Kuomintang (KMT) Legislator Jason Hsu (許毓仁) at a meeting of the Legislature’s Judiciary and Organic Laws and Statutes Committee whether the government’s cross-strait policy needs to be revised after Taiwanese master baker Wu Pao-chun (吳寶春) made an online statement that he was born in “Taiwan, China,” apparently for fear of being branded a Taiwan independence supporter.

In the statement, Wu, who is seeking to expand his chain of bakeries to China, said he is proud of being Chinese and supports the “1992 consensus” which endorses the “one China” principle.

Wu’s statement came after Chinese netizens accused him of being pro-Taiwan independence.    [FULL  STORY]

GLOATING: Minister Without Portfolio John Deng expressed disappointment over the food ban referendum, saying people should not take ‘pleasure’ in the ruling party’s woes

Taipei Times
Date: Dec 13, 2018
By: Stacy Hsu  /  Staff reporter

Minister Without Portfolio John Deng (鄧振中), head of the Office of Trade Negotiations,

on Tuesday said that the government would continue to improve ties with Japan and would not give up on seeking support for its bid to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP).

Deng made the remarks on the sidelines of a ceremony in Taipei to celebrate Japanese Emperor Akihito’s 85th birthday on Dec. 23, where Japanese Representative to Taiwan Mikio Numata said that despite Tokyo finding the results of the Nov. 24 referendum on a ban on some Japanese food imports “rather regrettable,” it would continue to collaborate with Taipei to create a bright future for both nations.

Numata’s comments represented a minor departure from the response to the referendum of Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Taro Kono, who said that the results have rendered Taiwan’s chance of joining the CPTPP unlikely and that Tokyo did not rule out taking the issue to the WTO.    [FULL  STORY]