Jason Hu

Infobox Mayor


image_width = 150px
name = Jason C. Hu
order =
office =Mayor of Taichung City
term_start =2002
term_end =
predecessor =Chang Wen-ing
birth_date = Birth date and age|1948|5|15|mf=y
birth_place = Beiping, China
field = International Relations
work_institution = National Sun Yat-sen University
alma_mater = National Chengchi University
University of Southampton
University of Oxford
doctoral_advisor = Hedley Bull

Jason C. Hu (Chinese: 胡志強; Pinyin: Hú Zhìqiáng; b. 1948) is a former official in the national government of Taiwan (Republic of China). He is currently serving his second term in the central Taiwan city of Taichung. His current term ends in early 2010 and is ineligible for re-election. He is a member of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), the leading party in the Pan-Blue alliance.

Early life and education

Hu was born in Beijing (then known as Peiping), China, and was brought to Taiwan as a young child when the Chinese Nationalists lost their civil war with the Communists.

After graduating from Taichung Municipal First High School, then known as Juren (居仁) High School, Jason Hu attended National Chengchi University where studied in the Diplomatic Studies Department. Following graduation in 1970, he went to study in the United Kingdom, first to the University of Southampton, where he studied International Relations, then to the University of Oxford where he received his PhD in International Relations in 1984.

When he returned to Taiwan, he became a professor at the Sun Yat-Sen Institute for International Studies at National Sun Yat-sen University. He would remain a professor there until he entered government service in 1990. [cite web|url=http://village.nat.gov.tw/dept/index.jsp?vcode=37659|title=臺中市(Taichung City)|accessdate=2006-10-19]

Central Government

Jason Hu began his work in the central government when Taiwan was still a single-party state ruled by the Chinese Nationalist Party. He was the Director General for the Government Information Office from 1991 to 1996. He then represented Taiwan's government in Washington in 1996 and 1997 as the Director of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in Washington, before a two-year stint as the Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1997 to 1999. [ cite web|url=http://www.gio.gov.tw/taiwan-website/5-gp/yearbook/p446.html|title=Who's Who in Taiwan|accessdate=2006-10-19]

Taichung City Mayor

Jason Hu returned to Taichung where he spent most of his childhood to run for mayor in 2001. [cite web|url=http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/local/archives/2001/08/14/98471/print|title=Elections 2001: Hu takes leap into Taichung politics|date=October 14, 2001|accessdate=2006-10-19] He was able to win the three-way race with more than forty-nine percent of the vote. Mayor Hu took office in early 2002.

He has been trying to build up Taichung’s infrastructure since his election. He has seen the construction of a new baseball stadium, new amphitheater, and expansion of main roadways in the city. He has tried to bring a branch of the Guggenheim Museum to Taichung, but to this point, there has been no apparent success in these efforts.

Terror Poster Controversy

A reason for the failure to bring the Guggenheim to Taichung may have something to do with the Terror Poster that was used as a part of the pan-Blue presidential campaign of Lien Chan and James Soong in the 2004 presidential race. [ cite web|url=http://www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/article.asp?parentid=9544|title=TAIWAN: Jason Hu let 'terror' poster stay in circulation|date=March 27, 2004|accessdate=2006-10-19]

Calming tensions

The presidential election itself was very close, and hot tempers broke out all over the country, especially in Taipei and Kaohsiung. There was also potential for serious trouble in Taichung as well as pan-Blue supporters had begun demonstrating overnight. Mayor Hu went out at about 3:30 in the morning and was successful in dispersing the one or two thousand people by 5:30. Mayor Hu remarked, "(b)ecause I knew that if I didn't do anything by 5:30 a.m., people getting out of bed would find out about it on the radio or television. There'd be 10,000, 20,000 people. By then you wouldn't be able to resolve it." [cite web|url=http://archive.wn.com/2004/04/07/1400/p/7d/561f34feee5b53.html|title= Taichung Mayor Hu discusses election campaign and aftermath|date=April 7, 2004|accessdate=2006-10-19]

Re-election

Jason Hu won re-election with relative ease in the December three-in-one elections with a nearly twenty percent margin of victory over Democratic Progressive Party challenger Lin Chia-lung. His second term began in early 2006 and will end in early 2010.

Car accident

On November 18, 2006, returning from a campaign rally for KMT Kaohsiung mayoral candidate Huang Chun-ying (黃俊英), the vehicle Hu and his wife Shaw Hsiao-ling (邵曉鈴) were riding in were hit by another vehicle and overturned. Hu suffered minor injuries, while Shaw suffered major injuries and had to be put into a drug-induced coma to preserve her life. Since then, she had come out of her coma and regained some ability to walk and talk, but her abilities to reason and to remember appeared to have been impaired.

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