A pan-green camp challenger to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) in the 2012 presidential election could emerge as early as spring, a newspaper quoted senior Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) officials as saying yesterday.
In a front-page story published in the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper), DPP Secretary-General Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全) said during a meeting on Monday that he hoped the party could complete the presidential and legislator-at-large nominees by the end of March.
The move, if passed by a gathering of the Party Congress on Jan. 22, would give DPP candidates more time to campaign, with the legislative elections set to take place late next year and the presidential election in March 2012.
The DPP is under pressure for a significant rebound in the two elections after failing to take any new seats in the special municipality elections last month.
There is also a high possibility the party could base the decision entirely on telephone opinion surveys, the report said, in a move that could attract opposition from several rumored DPP presidential candidates, including former vice president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮).
Other possible contenders for the nomination include DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), former premiers Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) and Frank Hsieh (謝長廷), but none have made their intentions public.
DPP spokesperson Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦) confirmed that Su Jia-chyuan held a meeting with several senior party officials on Monday, but maintained that no decision had been made.
“It is true that Su [Jia-chyuan] told the meeting he wanted to see a decision on the presidential nominations made soon in order to select a candidate more quickly,” Cheng said. “The final decision will be left up to the Central Executive Committee.”
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