Following his failed bid, early in January, to be the President of Taiwan, Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) was voted out of office as the mayor of Kaohsiung city in Taiwan. The vote to recall him was held on Saturday June 6. He thus became the first Taiwanese elected official ever to be removed in a recall election. The voter turnout was 42.14 percent with over 939,090 voting Yea and 25,051 voting Nay. The number of Yea votes not only exceeded the minimum votes required, which was 574,996, but also surpassed the 890,000 votes that Han gained when he was voted into the position of mayor back in November 2018. On June 6, the news topped the search results on the Internet in the mainland. Mainland media including Phoenix, Sina, Global Times, CCTV, and The Paper broadcasted the breaking news. People started to post online comments such as, “This is the fate of two-faced person.” “It turns out that this is a democratic society. Our system is different. Although we have not experienced the election of our local leaders, after this time, we now realize what democracy is! The people can vote you in and vote you out!” “I am jealous! This is the advantage of having a vote. When an official does not rule for the people, he can be directly kicked out.”
Six months after Han became the mayor of Kaohsiung in 2018, he announced his bid to run in the presidential election. Han was criticized because he failed the people who had given him a chance to pull down the Democratic Progressive Party of Taiwan and because he advanced the mainland’s interest in Taiwan. Just as Zhang Boyang, deputy director of the Taiwan Statebuilding Party explained, “This is not just the people of Kaohsiung expressing their voices to politicians; it is also the people of Kaohsiung once again saying no to the Chinese Communist Party and Xi Jinping.”
Sources:
1. Epoch Times, June 6, 2020
https://www.epochtimes.com/gb/20/6/6/n12167052.htm
2. Radio Free Asia, June 6, 2020
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/gangtai/hcm-06062020124206.html