The Taiwan High Court will hold its first hearing on a lawsuit filed by the pan-blue alliance to nullify the March 20 election so that a new one can be held, judicial sources said yesterday.
The election annulment suit targets the Central Election Commission (CEC) as well as city and county election commissions around the country.
It was the second lawsuit filed by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the People First Party (PFP).
The pan-blue alliance's lawyers said they would focus on three points to back up their suit.
First, they claimed that the simultaneous holding of the presidential election and the nation's first-ever referendum on China's missile threat was both illegal and
unconstitutional.
Second, the lawyers said, the CEC failed to suspend the presidential election after President Chen Shui-bian (
They said the commission should have announced a postponement of the poll, given that the election-eve shooting could unfairly have swayed the voting results and that the activation of the emergency security mechanism in the wake of the shooting had prevented thousands of military personnel and policemen from going to the polls.
Third, the lawyers claimed that they have collected evidence showing that some polling stations had violated the rules in vote-counting procedures.
The pan-blue alliance has also filed a lawsuit to annul the election result.
The Taiwan High Court is scheduled to start a vote recount May 10 to decide whether to overturn the election result.
The court will open a training class today to brief representatives from district courts around the country on major guidelines for a vote recount.
About 150 court representatives, including judges and other court personnel, are expected to attend the class.
Shortly after the election result was announced on March 20, all ballot boxes and eligible voter rosters were sealed at district courts around the country at the request of the pan-blue alliance.
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