Witnesses back my case: Huang

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Kaohsiung mayoral candidate Huang Chun-ying's (黃俊英) camp yesterday said it had been told by a number of people that Saturday's vote count procedures were flawed.

Huang has filed a lawsuit asking for the results of the mayoral election to be invalidated.

"Those witnesses will testify in court, but we did not detail their cases today because it would be better to keep that information confidential before the hearing," Huang's spokesman Apollo Chen (陳學聖) told a press conference.

The witnesses had seen members of Kaoshiung Election Committee miscount votes at various polling stations, Chen said.

Huang also told the press conference that his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) rival Chen Chu (陳菊) resorted to the "dirty trick" of trying to besmirch him on the eve of the election by accusing him of being involved in vote-buying.

This accusation had affected voters on Friday, constituted "cheating" and therefore the election should be declared invalid.

Chang Hsueh-ming (張學明), lead prosecutor at the Taiwan High Court Prosecutors' Kaohsiung Office, told the Taipei Times yesterday that his office's investigation into the vote-buying allegation against Huang would be critical to Huang's lawsuit.

Chang said if the accusation was proven groundless, the lawsuit to nullify the election would favor Huang.

Kaoshiung prosecutors were still looking yesterday for Ku Hsin-ming (古鋅酩), who rented two buses to carry Huang's supporters to an election-eve rally on Friday.

Kaohsiung District Prosecutors' Office spokesman Chung Chung-hsiao (鍾忠孝) said an arrest warrant had been issued for Ku because he left his Kaoshiung residence after the vote-buying allegation. Ku has also been barred from leaving the country, Chung said.

Late on Friday night, Chen's camp said that five young DPP volunteers who were pretending to be Huang supporters heading for the rally saw a Huang staffer, nicknamed Hei Sung (黑松), give NT$500 to every passenger on the two buses and instruct them to vote for Huang.

Chung said investigators had not been able to identify Hei Sung and he asked people who were on the buses to report to the prosecutors.

"We want to find all participants," he said.

Huang lost to Chen Chu by a margin of 0.14 percent, 378,303 votes to 379,417 votes.

On Sunday, Kaohsiung judges approved Huang's request that the city's ballot boxes be impounded as evidence in his vote recount lawsuit.

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Editorial: A recount yes, mischief no