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Tainan speaker election marred by violence

KMT Tainan City Councillor Hung Yu-feng (seated).

Tainan speaker election marred by violence

KMT Tainan City Councillor Hung Yu-feng (seated).

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – An attempt to elect a new speaker for the Tainan City Council failed Friday while clashes erupted between the two main political parties.
The election became necessary when a court decided on August 30 that incumbent speaker Lee Chuan-chiao of the Kuomintang should be stripped of his seat on the council because of vote buying.
The opposition KMT condemned the special council session scheduled for Friday as illegal, and tried to prevent it from going ahead by locking the acting speaker, Kuo Hsin-liang of the Democratic Progressive Party, inside his office.
During heated exchanges, fighting broke out, and DPP councilor Kuo Ching-hua reportedly came to blows with KMT councilor Hung Yu-feng, who was shown covering one of her eyes and being carried away to hospital. As a result of the incident, the meeting was cancelled.
The KMT boycotted previous meetings because it said Mayor William Lai was interfering with the process. However, a majority of city councilors signed a petition in favor of a special session of the council, which would have taken place Friday.
Allegations of vote buying against Lee started right after his election as speaker on December 25, 2014. His victory was a surprise because the DPP had won a majority on the council in the November 29 elections of that year.
Mayor Lai and his city government team refused to attend sessions of the city council as long as the investigation into the alleged vote buying had not been completed. The boycott lasted 234 days, but in the end several court sessions ended up reaching verdicts against Lee.
Last April, he was found guilty by the Tainan District Court of buying votes in the speaker election and was sentenced to four years in prison, though the appeals process in that case is still continuing.