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One of the top stories from this past week was the passing of Singapore’s founding father, Lee Kuan Yew on Monday at the age of 91.
President Ma Ying-jeou made a brief trip to the Southeast Asian nation early in the week to pay his respects. He thanked the Singaporean government for giving him a chance to express his condolences and said he hopes that Taiwan and Singapore will continue to enjoy a strong relationship in the future.
Ma said that Lee had visited Taiwan 25 times during his life, more than any other head of state. Upon returning to Taiwan, Ma spoke to reporters about Lee’s longstanding concern for the development of peaceful cross-strait relations.
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Also this past week, Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je has been in office for three months now and his approval ratings are at 75 percent. That’s higher than the 68 percent he had when he just entered office.
Mayor Ko Wen-je has tried to cut down on corruption and waste during his first months in office. He is also known for speaking his mind, and has had a few slips of the tongue that got him into trouble. When asked about his high approval rating on Tuesday, this is what Mayor Ko had to say:
Ko said, "I want to thank the employees at the Taipei City Government. Everyone has been working very hard. I also want to thank the support of the people. I think we will continue to work hard according to our convictions. And one more thing, if there is a mistake, I will correct it right away. We make changes quickly so we treat criticism as an opportunity to reflect."
In the past three months, Ko has saved the city NT$600 million. But Mayor Ko said he’s not done yet. There will be more money to be saved, he says, when he looks at the figures even more carefully.
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And finally this past week, unemployment in Taiwan has fallen to a 15-year low of 3.69%. That was the word from the government statistics office on Monday.
The February jobless rate dropped 0.02 points. That means the number of people without a job in Taiwan dropped by 2,000 from the previous month to 428,000.
According to the statistics office, the jobless rate in the 20-24 age bracket went down most significantly. It fell 1.06 percentage points year-on-year in February to 12.32 percent. As for people with a university degree, unemployment dropped substantially to 4.75 percent in February from the same month last year. The office said these figures show that more young people and job seekers with higher education are finding employment.
However, the statistics office said that unemployment data in March could be affected by a wave of job switching in February and March—a peak season for job hunting in Taiwan. They say that March figures will depend on how fast these job hoppers find new employment.