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Despite call for unity, Su-Hsieh rivalry continues

Democratic Progressive Party presidential candidate Frank Hsieh receives some instruction in how to give a massage during his visit to the Love Home in Taichung City yesterday. PHOTO: CHAN CHAO-YANG, TAIPEI TIMES

The wrangling between Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) and former premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷), who are vying for the Democratic Progressive Party's (DPP) presidential nomination, continued yesterday despite President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) call for party unity last Friday.

Hsieh's campaign team yesterday released the results of a survey conducted on its behalf by Taiwan Real Survey from Tuesday to Thursday among 1,070 respondents. The survey claimed that Hsieh had more support than Su among pan-green and "light blue" voters.

The poll showed that 44.4 percent of pan-green respondents favored Hsieh, while 21.4 percent supported Su.

Swing voters

According to the survey, Hsieh also had more support than Su among swing voters and "light blue" supporters, with 27.7 percent of respondents saying they preferred Hsieh, while 18.7 percent said they supported Su.

A press release from Hsieh's campaign said it had published the results of its survey to end the "war" between the pair.

Soon after the Hsieh camp's press conference, Su's campaign team held its own meeting with the media announcing the results of an opinion poll it had commissioned Master Survey and Research to conduct.

"After Hsieh made his poll results public, we had no choice but to announce ours, as we are losing patience," said Lan Shih-tsung (藍世聰), director of Su's campaign office.

DPP Legislator Wu Ping-jui (吳秉叡) criticized the Hsieh camp for releasing its poll results to Set-TV.

Not for deep-blues

In contrast to Hsieh's survey, Su's poll, which also excluded deep-blue supporters, showed that respondents favored Su by 24.5 percent to Hsieh's 23.5 percent.

Su's campaign team also announced the results of another survey in which respondents were polled regardless of their political affiliation.

The survey showed 24.9 percent support for Su and 22.6 percent for Hsieh.

"The poll conducted by Hsieh's camp was just ridiculous. It is actually a closely fought race. The margin of about 1 percentage point is within the acceptable error range," said DPP Legislator Lin Yu-sheng (林育生), a spokesman for Su's campaign office.

Lin said that the polling company that had been commissioned by Hsieh's camp was "not credible."

A survey the company had conducted ahead of the 2004 presidential election gave the pan-blue camp's former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Lien Chan (連戰) and People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) a 10-percentage-point lead over the DPP's President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and Vice President Annette Lu (呂秀蓮), Lin added.
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