The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday said that President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) will win the presidential election by about 160,000 votes against the opposition pan-blue presidential ticket featuring Lien Chan (連戰) and James Soong (宋楚瑜).
Optimistic about the election, the director of the DPP's Public Opinion Survey Center, Chen Chun-lin (
"The DPP is expected to beat the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and People First Party (PFP) alliance by 167,707 ballots, a 1.2 percent vote difference," Chen said yesterday.
PHOTO: CHEN TSEH-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
Chen estimated there would be an 80 percent voter turnout from among the nation's total of 16,504,179 eligible voters.
In the major six electoral districts around the nation, Chen said that the DPP would lose in northern Taiwan's Taipei City and Taipei County by 291,187 votes, as well as in the Taoyuan, Hsinchu and Miaoli areas by some 270,035 votes.
In central Taiwan's Taichung, Changhua and Nantou areas, the DPP is drawn in a tight match with the KMT and is estimated to lose by some 4,408 votes.
PHOTO: CHEN TSEH-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
However, in the DPP's stronghold in southern Taiwan, the party will win with an estimate of 467,722 votes over the pan-blue alliance in Yunlin, Chiayi and Tainan counties and by another 371,925 votes in the Kaohsiung and Pingtung areas.
As for eastern Taiwan's Ilan, Hualien and Taitung counties and the offshore islands, the DPP predicted that it would lose by about 106,309 votes against the blue alliance.
Regarding public support for the referendum, DPP campaign executive director Chiou I-jen (
Chiou yesterday also disclosed that the KMT has tried to bribe voters in southern Taiwan by purchasing identification cards -- required personal IDs to cast votes, and promised free tours to voters on election day.
Alain Robert, known as the "French Spider-Man," praised Alex Honnold as exceptionally well-prepared after the US climber completed a free solo ascent of Taipei 101 yesterday. Robert said Honnold's ascent of the 508m-tall skyscraper in just more than one-and-a-half hours without using safety ropes or equipment was a remarkable achievement. "This is my life," he said in an interview conducted in French, adding that he liked the feeling of being "on the edge of danger." The 63-year-old Frenchman climbed Taipei 101 using ropes in December 2004, taking about four hours to reach the top. On a one-to-10 scale of difficulty, Robert said Taipei 101
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