Premier Frank Hsieh (
Cabinet Spokesman Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said at a press conference that after Premier Hsieh heard the news that the DPP had lost the local government elections to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) at 7pm Saturday, he met with President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and offered to resign.
"Hsieh told Chen he would take responsibility for the poor result of the elections," Cho said.
Cho said Chen did not accept Hsieh's resignation. Hsieh yesterday afternoon met Chen and again offered to resign, but Chen still did not accept the offer.
According to Cho, Chen said that the government's priority is to take measures to stabilize the political situation and society, and that he wanted Hsieh to keep his office.
The KMT won a lanslide victory over the DPP in Saturday's elections. The KMT won 14 out of 23 city and county constituencies, while the DPP -- which previously controlled 10 counties and cities -- won just six seats.
In two key races, the Democratic Progressive Party's (DPP) Luo Wen-chia (羅文嘉) gave up Taipei County to the KMT's Chou Hsi-wei (周錫瑋), and the DPP's Chen Ding-nan (陳定南) conceded defeat to his KMT rival, Lu Kuo-hua (呂國華), in Ilan County.
To express their regret over the defeat and accept responsibility for the outcome, Su, Presidential Office Secretary-General Yu Shyi-kun and Hsieh bowed to the public three times on Saturday night.
DPP Chairman Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) offered to resign on Saturday night.
Analysts have said one of the key factors for the DPP's failure in the elections was the Kaohsiung Rapid Transit Corp (KRTC) scandal.
Because Hsieh was mayor of Kaohsiung when the city's MRT project was being planned and a number of the city's officials have been indicted for involvement in the scandal, both opposition and ruling party members have said that Hsieh should take responsibility for the scandal and poor result of the elections.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday inaugurated the Danjiang Bridge across the Tamsui River in New Taipei City, saying that the structure would be an architectural icon and traffic artery for Taiwan. Feted as a major engineering achievement, the Danjiang Bridge is 920m long, 211m tall at the top of its pylon, and is the longest single-pylon asymmetric cable-stayed bridge in the world, the government’s Web site for the structure said. It was designed by late Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid. The structure, with a maximum deck of 70m, accommodates road and light rail traffic, and affords a 200m navigation channel for boats,
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