Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) will be nominated by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to run in next year’s presidential election, becoming the first woman in the nation’s history to run for the post.
Her narrow win in the part primaries means she will go on to run against President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), four years after he trounced the DPP in a landslide vote on policies of economic growth and closer cross-strait ties.
While Tsai is all but certain to take the nomination, the final announcement will not take place until May 4 — when the DPP’s Central Standing Committee meets.
Photo: AFP
“I officially recognize and congratulate Tsai Ing-wen’s win,” said Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘), the acting DPP chairperson while Tsai is taking a leave of absence.
“The verdict today marks the start of a new round of cooperation, but also new challenges and responsibilities,” Ker said.
Results of the official telephone polls — comparative surveys that were conducted on Monday and Tuesday — were disclosed by the DPP at noon yesterday.
They gave Tsai a higher support rating when matched against Ma than former premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌).
In the DPP-commissioned surveys, both candidates led Ma, but Tsai took 42.5 percent to Ma’s 35 percent, while Su defeated Ma 41.1 percent to 33.8 percent, reflecting what for both were tightly fought primaries, with the two neck-and-neck in previous non-official polls.
Tsai and Su were closely matched, but under the party’s regulations the candidate with the higher support rating was declared the winner.
The disclosure brings to an end to a two-month race that remained restrained and civil amid a focus on uniting the party for the election. Su said afterwards that he respected the results and called for his supporters to back Tsai.
The victory for Tsai, a former law professor, broke gender barriers and represented a remarkable rise for a person who only joined the DPP seven years ago.
Tsai will face tough competition against Ma, whose administration has assailed her policies — from phasing out nuclear power to -favoring a more cautious -cross-strait -approach — as ideologically based and detached from current realities.
She will have seven months to convince voters before the combined elections take place in January next year.
“From this point forward, we only have one target. That is to unite the DPP and unite Taiwan, and to fight together to win next year’s legislative and presidential elections,” Tsai said in prepared remarks hours after the win. “Everybody in this party and the Taiwanese public must take on this heavy burden and win back Taiwan.”
Tsai has favored a more moderate China policy that she has described as more stable and consistent.
Early in the primaries, she also proposed phasing out -nuclear -energy by 2025 if alternative sources of energy can be found — a move that has attracted criticism from both inside and outside the DPP.
She has spearheaded the DPP’s “10-year master plan,” a paper on how the party plans to tackle future challenges, such as an aging population, environmental degradation and cross-strait policy, which is expected to play a key part in her campaign.
However, her first priority appears to center on ensuring that the party is united. Tsai used most of her prepared remarks yesterday to emphasize the need for DPP supporters to rally together, regardless of how they voted in the primaries, to increase the DPP’s seats in the legislature and to upset Ma’s re-election bid.
She expressed gratitude to Su and former DPP chairperson Hsu Hsin-liang (許信良), the third candidate, bowing and thanking them for their contributions to the party. The two are “irreplaceable assets,” she said.
“In the shortest time possible, I will round up our party’s talent and [ability], regardless of which camp they belonged to in the primaries. We are all part of the DPP,” Tsai said.
Su’s immediate endorsement of Tsai will likely alleviate some of the concerns that the primary would split the party. Su had commanded support from large swaths of the party’s old guard and younger tech-savvy voters.
Tensions were only heightened twice during the two-month primary.
Tsai’s campaign team had called on DPP supporters to “only support” Tsai — implicitly asking them to vote for Ma against Su in the comparative polls — and a leak of some early poll numbers took place on Monday, with allegations that Tsai’s campaign team was the source.
However, she emerged relatively unscathed from these events, downplaying the “only support” slogan, while a spokesperson denied the leak.
If elected, she will become Taiwan’s first female president. The highest government post previously held by a woman was when former vice president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) was elected on the DPP ticket in 2000 and again in 2004.
Pro-independence leader Koo Kwang-ming (辜寬敏), a former presidential advisor who had a falling out with Tsai, said he “unequivocally supports Tsai Ing-wen without reservations,” at a separate press conference yesterday.
With the primaries now over, the focus is expected to turn to who Tsai will select as a running mate. The decision is expected sometime after May 4, when the nomination is confirmed, campaign officials said.
Former premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and DPP secretary-general Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全) have been floated as possible candidates. Su Tseng-chang has rejected the vice presidency outright, as well as any other role, such as DPP caucus head or legislative speaker.
“It’s too early. A decision will take a few weeks,” said Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青), a Tsai spokesperson.
Tsai is expected to resume her duties as chairperson of the party shortly after May 4, ending the extended leave of absence she took to campaign for the primary.
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
TRADE: A mandatory declaration of origin for manufactured goods bound for the US is to take effect on May 7 to block China from exploiting Taiwan’s trade channels All products manufactured in Taiwan and exported to the US must include a signed declaration of origin starting on May 7, the Bureau of Foreign Trade announced yesterday. US President Donald Trump on April 2 imposed a 32 percent tariff on imports from Taiwan, but one week later announced a 90-day pause on its implementation. However, a universal 10 percent tariff was immediately applied to most imports from around the world. On April 12, the Trump administration further exempted computers, smartphones and semiconductors from the new tariffs. In response, President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration has introduced a series of countermeasures to support affected
CROSS-STRAIT: The vast majority of Taiwanese support maintaining the ‘status quo,’ while concern is rising about Beijing’s influence operations More than eight out of 10 Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework for cross-strait relations, according to a survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday. The MAC’s latest quarterly survey found that 84.4 percent of respondents opposed Beijing’s “one country, two systems” formula for handling cross-strait relations — a figure consistent with past polling. Over the past three years, opposition to the framework has remained high, ranging from a low of 83.6 percent in April 2023 to a peak of 89.6 percent in April last year. In the most recent poll, 82.5 percent also rejected China’s
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
RSS