In a bid to maximize its legislative seats, the DPP yesterday decided to expand its vote allocation strategy to four more constituencies.
"The party's Central Standing Committee has reached a resolution that the strategy for vote allocation should be employed and reinforced in constituencies in Tainan and Nantou Counties and Kaohsiung City's southern and northern districts, following the example of Taipei's constituencies," the party's Deputy Secretary-General Hsu Yang-ming (
The party is already using the strategy in Taipei City's southern and northern constituencies.
Hsu urged DPP supporters to distribute their votes evenly to DPP candidates in order to increase the party's gains in the election.
After a discussion on the matter in the committee's meeting earlier yesterday, DPP Chairman Frank Hsieh (
Hsieh said that the party's polls indicate that gaps of support for DPP candidates in the constituencies were widely divided and the highly-supported candidates' ratings could be as much as five to ten times higher than those who have barely enough support to be elected.
Hsieh said that the committee believes that if Taipei City's strategy for vote allocation is adopted in these constituencies, the election prospects of five candidates who currently face an uphill battle would turn promising.
"If the strategy is successfully put into action, five seats could certainly be gained. If not, at least there would be two to three seats secured," Hsieh said, adding that the party's central headquarters would pass on the strategy to local divisions for implementation.
Hsieh added,"If the candidate who has the most votes could allow some of his votes to go to the candidates with not enough votes to get elected, he will help increase the party's total seats."
Ten DPP candidates in Taipei's southern and northern districts have announced their plans to court votes from supporters in accordance with the final digits of voters' ID numbers. For example, voters in Taipei City's northern district whose ID card numbers end in "one" or "two" are asked to vote for Lan Shih-tsung (藍世聰), while those whose numbers end in "three" or "four" are asked to vote for Lo Wen-chia (羅文嘉). In other constituencies, voters' birth dates are used as a means for determining how to distribute votes among DPP candidates, according to party plans.
The committee yesterday also finalized a proposal that stipulates all party candidates must endorse the party's legislative reform plans, which include cutting the 225-member legislature by half and implementing a single district/two votes system after the elections.
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