Two political figures of different parties who intend to run for magistrate of Kaohsiung County announced yesterday that they will jointly hold an opinion poll to decide who represents the two parties as a whole in the race.
Chung Shao-ho (鍾紹和) of the People First Party (PFP) and Huang Pa-yeh (黃八野) of the KMT made the announcement at a news conference held at the Grand Hotel in Kaohsiung.
Domestic political circles are calling the move a "pan-blue army integration" action, meaning cross-party cooperation by the opposition to push out other candidates for the year-end legislative and local government elections.
Blue is the main color on the KMT flag. Presently the KMT is the biggest opposition party.
Speaking at the news conference, Chung said it is the feeling of most residents of Kaohsiung County that the KMT and the PFP should join hands in running for Kaohsiung County magistrate. Chung said that this is what has made them decide to let public opinion determine who will represent the "pan-blue army."
Placing first in an intra-KMT primary election for Kaohsiung County magistrate, Huang said that he and Chung had extended a friendly offer to KMT-nominated candidate Wu Kuang-hsun (
Chung and Huang said they will notify their respective party headquarters and engage in a week-long opinion poll starting today. The two added that no factors would change their minds about conducting the survey and that they would respect the results of the poll.
The KMT and another opposition party, the New Party, had reached a consensus last Thursday that pushed out the New Party's Wang Chien-shien to represent the "pan-blue army" in the race for magistrate of Taipei County in the year-end elections.
The KMT originally nominated Lin Chih-chia (
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