The Taichung mayor election is shaping up to be interesting. KMT Legislator from Fengyuan Johnny Chaing is throwing his hat into the ring. Here is his announcement from his Facebook page. If you can't read it in Chinese, just click on the translation. The issues he names are pollution and transportation, two locally important issues.
Remember, this year Taichung has become Taiwan's second largest city. In the battleground of central Taiwan, Taichung may well become a stepping stone to the Presidency, especially if Taipei stays with Ko Wen-che so that no DPP politician is associated with Taipei, and the KMT runs or wins with an old-fashioned ideologue like Alex Tsai who is unelectable on a national level. A KMT politician who can do well or even win in Taichung has demonstrated he can appeal to the center on local issues. Presidential...
As we discussed, a longtime observer of local politics observed.....
Friend 1: I notice how he frames pollution, as a problem to be investigated. That sounds a lot like a page from climate change denialist rhetoric 101. If I am not mistaken, the KMT has routinely opposed clean energy and supported both nuclear and coal, no?_______________________
Michael Turton: yup
Longtime Taichung politics observer: It's shaping up at this point to be the "the" issue of the campaign. Lin hasn't been able to live up to his promises, in part from opposition from the central govt, but in part because he is caught between needing more and more power to support his big push to draw in more investment and industry here to create jobs (like the giant TSMC fab and Micron) and cutting power output from the Taichung Power Plant to reduce air pollution. He wants Taipower to foot the bill for a big shift to natural gas and away from coal, but he's got basically no support from the Tsai administration, and they've blocked the law he got through city council aiming to cut emissions from the top emitters (Taichung Power Plant, Dragon Steel) by 10% annually. He claims he's cut air pollution by about a third, but people have trouble believing it. His officials have said things like "we've cut pollution, but not visible pollution". Lots of suspicion on the govt statistics to put it mildly, and if a certain someone's blog is to be believed, there is a significant pollution spike in the middle of the night, most likely factories releasing pollutants on the sly. So, in spite of all their actions and behaviour in the past, the KMT locally is going to hit him hard on this... (Yes, I know you know most of this, this is kind of a primer for anyone interested).
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A few weeks back, I attended the annual Sydney Taiwan Festival, which was held outdoors in the centre of Chatswood shopping district (something of a Chinese enclave). There were various promotional stalls, cultural displays and food outlets – one of the longest queues being for 'Small Sausage within a Large Sausage". Didn’t get to try that, but it sounded good.
The Taichung City Government was one of the sponsors, but regrettably, its stall was not pulling the crowds. I went over expecting to find various leaflets promoting various cultural attractions, but only two rather token items were on offer.
Firstly, The Sound of Blooming, which was to promote the 2018 Taichung World Flora Exhibition, and published by Mayor Chia-Lung Lin. Secondly, Savouring Taichung, which I assumed would be a guide to culinary delights, but which turned out to be promoting agricultural products such as Dragon Fruit and Shochu. It also promoted the Flora Exhibition, and had a foreword by Mayor Lin.
Apart from those two flyers, there seemed to be little else on offer to promote Taichung as a destination. Hopefully, next year, the Government might try a little harder.
Overall, the Festival was absolutely packed, even though there weren’t huge numbers of gweilos in evidence.
A few weeks back, I attended the annual Sydney Taiwan Festival, which was held outdoors in the centre of Chatswood shopping district (something of a Chinese enclave). There were various promotional stalls, cultural displays and food outlets – one of the longest queues being for 'Small Sausage within a Large Sausage". Didn’t get to try that, but it sounded good.
The Taichung City Government was one of the sponsors, but regrettably, its stall was not pulling the crowds. I went over expecting to find various leaflets promoting various cultural attractions, but only two rather token items were on offer.
Firstly, The Sound of Blooming, which was to promote the 2018 Taichung World Flora Exhibition, and published by Mayor Chia-Lung Lin. Secondly, Savouring Taichung, which I assumed would be a guide to culinary delights, but which turned out to be promoting agricultural products such as Dragon Fruit and Shochu. It also promoted the Flora Exhibition, and had a foreword by Mayor Lin.
Apart from those two flyers, there seemed to be little else on offer to promote Taichung as a destination. Hopefully, next year, the Government might try a little harder.
Overall, the Festival was absolutely packed, even though there weren’t huge numbers of gweilos in evidence.
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