Chen wins, Lien demands recount
Incumbent President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and running mate Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) have won the election by 2,9518 votes. Central Election Commission Chairman George Huang (黃石城) made a formal announcement of the results at 9:20 pm. The Chen-Lu ticket won a total of 6,471,970 votes while the opposition ticket, featuring Lien Chan (連戰) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)and James Soong (宋楚瑜) of the People First Party (PFP), won 6,442,452 votes, Huang said.
The turnout for the presidential election was 80.28 percent.
Responding to the opposition demand for invalidation of the results and a recount of the votes, Huang said the opposition must file an application with the court in accordance with the Election and Recall Law.
Speaking to crowds of supporters in front of the KMT headquarters earlier, Lien and Soong called the election "unfair", citing that the election was held under suspicious circumstances.
They were referring to the assassination attempt on Chen and Lu on Friday, one day before the vote. Chen and Lu suffered gunshot wounds in the incident in southern Taiwan. The incident is believed to have swayed some voters to
Chen's camp.
Chen won the election by a margin of around 0.2 percent. Lien and Soong ran separately in the previous presidential election in 2000 and won a combined 58 percent. A Lien-Soong joint ticket this time meant an extremely tough race for Chen.
In his victory speech, Chen thanked the opposition for its "criticism and instructions" and vowed to listen to different opinions to promote Taiwan's democracy, solidarity and harmony. Chen did not respond to the opposition demand of a recount in his speech.
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