More than half of the respondents in a monthly poll are not satisfied with President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) cross-strait performance, while her approval rating dropped by 2.7 percentage points to 43.7 percent, the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation said yesterday.
Fifty-two percent of respondents in the foundation’s latest poll said they were not satisfied with how Tsai is handling cross-strait relations, while 36.4 percent were satisfied.
Since November last year, more people have become dissatisfied with Tsai’s cross-strait performance, with the highest level of dissastisfaction of 58.2 percent seen in June, foundation chairman You Ying-lung (游盈隆) said.
Photo: Chen Chih-chu, Taipei Times
“Although the dissatisfaction rate has been lowered, it remains at ‘red alert’ level, which, if it persists, could drag down the president’s reputation and her leverage to negotiate with the Chinese Communist Party,” You said.
While 43.7 percent of respondents this month approved of Tsai, 37.7 percent disapproved of her, something You attributed to Tsai’s pre-emption of a proposal to ask the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to lobby the government to pardon former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).
The failure of the proposal during the DPP’s national congress on Sept. 24 angered Chen’s supporters, he said.
However, Tsai has been able to keep her approval rating relatively stable since Premier William Lai (賴清德) took office early last month because she has not been as involved in managing the government as she was during former premier Lin Chuan’s (林全) term, You said.
Presidential Office spokesman Alex Huang (黃重諺) yesterday said the government’s cross-strait policy is based on public consensus, and the nation’s core interest and is supported by the public.
A variety of surveys, including those conducted by the Mainland Affairs Council, have shown that the majority of the public supports the government’s China policy, Huang said.
The government has endeavored to maintain peace and stability and has continued to extend goodwill to China in a bid to reconcile differences, he said.
Beijing should work with Taipei to maintain regional stability and the well-being of Taiwanese and Chinese, he said.
Lai earned an approval rating of 58 percent, while 21.4 percent of the respondents disapproved of his performance, the foundation said.
Lai scored 62.02 on the “feeling thermometer,” a slight drop from 63.44 last month, suggesting that his popularity is still high, You said.
Lai has introduced tangible policies since taking office, including a pay raise for public employees, a highway toll-free policy during the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, a proposal to modify a controversial labor law, as well as reiterating his personal pro-independence stance, You said.
Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) scored 62.64 on the feeling thermometer, down from 66.75 last month, You said.
The poll also gauged public confidence in eight professionals and found that people have highest confidence in business leaders (58.1 percent) and least confidence in the Council of Grand Justices (25 percent).
The poll, conducted on Monday and Tuesday last week, collected 1,068 valid samples.
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