Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) presidential campaign theme of “Taiwan’s first female president” failed to resonate with voters, according to a poll released by the Taiwanese Association for Pacific Ocean Development (TAPOD) yesterday.
A survey conducted three days before Saturday’s presidential election, in which President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) won his re-election bid, showed that two in three voters, or 66.7 percent, said they were “not interested” in Tsai’s campaign theme, TAPOD chairman You Ying-lung (游盈隆) said at a press conference held to announce the results.
Only 25.5 percent of a total of 1,646 respondents said they supported the theme, You said, adding that the results were not released until yesterday because election law prohibits disclosure or distribution of any surveys during the final 10 days of an election campaign.
Tsai failed to garner support from women voters, trailing in support among women by 15 percent as data showed 43.6 percent of women voters favored Ma, while 28.6 percent supported Tsai, the survey found.
The poll showed that 40.1 percent of respondents said they would vote for Ma, 32.7 percent would vote for Tsai and 7.2 percent would support People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜).
Tsai’s initiative of a grand coalition government, unveiled during the last week of her campaign, did win support from 57.2 percent of the respondents, while 24 percent said they were against it.
On the DPP’s China policy, which was seen by many analysts as the major reason for Tsai’s loss, former DPP chairperson Hsu Hsin-liang (許信良) told the press conference that Tsai should try to incorporate her cross-strait initiative into a new party resolution to replace the existing one before she steps down on March 1.
Hsu said he agreed with former premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷), who said the DPP should revise the “Taiwan independence clause” since its China policy was unable to convince most voters.
“The last mile to the presidency that Tsai has mentioned will be the cross-strait issue,” Hsu said.
The DPP’s presidential campaign was hurt by the discussion of the so-called “1992 consensus” and pro-China comments made by several business leaders, he said.
“It is time for the DPP to adjust its China policy,” Hsu said.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS