With the Nov. 27 special municipality elections drawing closer, both the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) are gearing up their electoral campaigning in a bid to woo voters to their favor.
Sources from the KMT said the party plans to hold large-scale campaign activities next month, arranging for President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), who doubles as party chairman, to campaign for its candidates at weekends.
The KMT will also use the party’s anniversary to campaign for its candidates, the sources said.
Large-scale campaign activities will be held in Taipei, Sinbei (as it will be called following Taipei County’s upgrade) and Greater Taichung on Nov. 20, and in Greater Tainan and Greater Kaohsiung the next day.
Ma and top party officials, including Vice President Vincent Siew (蕭萬長), Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) and Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平), will all attend the events to boost the party’s momentum.
According to the KMT sources, Ma remains the party’s most important figure to solicit support for candidates, despite the party’s disappointing performance in previous local elections last year.
The party will hold its weekly Central Standing Committee meeting in Taichung, Sinbei and Taipei in the following weeks, with Ma presiding over the meetings in the cities and leading the campaigning efforts, sources said.
As to campaign parties on the eve of the elections, the KMT said it was still evaluating the election outlook in each city and would decide on the city Ma will visit on that day at a later date.
Meanwhile, DPP sources said that the party, aside from planning large-scale campaign rallies for its mayoral candidates in the Greater Taichung and Greater Tainan races, will also organize a joint rally to drum up support for its mayoral candidates in Taipei and Sinbei.
The party will also form a 1,000-strong group made up largely of young adults to mobilize young voters to vote for the DPP.
According to sources within the party, the DPP estimates that its mayoral candidates in the Taipei and Sinbei races so far have enjoyed a lead over their KMT counterparts from the voters in the 20 to 29 age group. However, given past experience, the turn-out among young voters is generally low and the sources said it is imperative for the party to encourage as many young voters to visit polling stations on the day of the election in order to increase its chances of winning.
As for the electoral outlook in the Greater Kaohsiung mayoral race, the sources said the DPP would continue to keep a close eye on the situation and monitor whether there would be a “dump-save” effect (棄保效應). The “dump-save” effect refers to strategic voting in which a party with little chance of winning leans toward one of the major parties during the campaign.
Following the resignation of Kaohsiung County Commissioner Yang Chiu-hsing (楊秋興) from the DPP in August when he declared his bid to run in the mayoral race as an independent, his entry has turned the race into a three-way contest, with DPP Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊) and KMT Legislator Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順).
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