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Hsieh proposes combining local government polls

Premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) yesterday proposed combining three local government elections scheduled for into one poll this year.

Hsieh made the announcement during the weekly meeting for Cabinet members yesterday morning.

Speaking on Hsieh's behalf, Cabinet Spokesman Chou Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that combining the three elections will help the government cut costs.

"There will be four elections before June next year. To save more money and time, we decided to combine three of them," Chou said at a press conference after the meeting.

The four elections Chou referred to include the election of National Assembly members in May, county commissioner and mayoral elections in December, county councilor elections in December and township mayoral elections in February next year.

Criticism

Hsieh's announcement was immediately criticized by both the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

Both parties said that combining the three elections would it easier for those who want to engage in vote-buying, while making it harder for law enforcement officers to carry out their jobs.

"These two are separate issues. We cannot hold back reforms just because of small frustrations like this," Hsieh said.

In the meantime, the Cabinet's Research, Development and Evaluation Commission made public a questionnaire from March 21 regarding the combination of the three elections.

The questionnaire showed that 58.1 percent of respondents supported the idea of combining the three elections.

The commission polled 1,110 people selected randomly from the white pages, with all interviewees being above 20 years old.

In response to Hsieh's proposal to combine the three types of election into one, the Central Election Commission (CEC) stated that the elections for city and county councilors, as well as village and township mayors, would be rescheduled, but that the final decision would be made by the Taiwan Election Commission (台灣省選委會).

Commission Deputy Secretary-General Teng Tien-yu (鄧天祐) said yesterday that the election for city and county mayors is supposed to take place before Dec. 20, while elections for city and county councilors as well as those for township and village mayors are supposed to take place before Feb. 20 next year.

If the three elections are to be combined, the election will be held before Dec. 20, Teng said.

Election commission has Final say

"These three elections have always been managed by the Taiwan Election Commission [台灣省選委會]. It will be in charge of drafting a plan to meet the change; the CEC has decided to let the Taiwan Election Commission make the final decision on whether to combine the elections," Teng said.

The Taiwan Election Commission consists of 21 regional election commissions.

According to the CEC, in 1977 a combined election was held, consisting of the three polls Hsieh mentioned. However, this arrangement was not repeated because of logistical obstacles.

Teng said that combining the polls would definitely increase the logistical complexity, but added that it would also reduce the amount of work involved and associated costs.
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