Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Eric Chu (朱立倫) is closing the gap with his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) rival, Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), with a difference of less than 10 percentage points, the KMT said yesterday, citing its latest survey.
According to the telephone-based poll, Tsai held on to the lead at 40.4 percent, but Chu — who garnered 30.9 percent — has narrowed the gap to 9.5 percentage points, the KMT said in a news release.
People First Party (PFP) presidential candidate James Soong (宋楚瑜) received 8.7 percent, while 20 percent of respondents declined to express their voting preference, the survey showed.
“In the run-up to the televised presidential debates [on Sunday and on Jan. 2], Chu has rolled out several concrete policies and engaged in meaningful dialogues with netizens, young people, and different ethnic groups and communities in Taiwan. It has helped his support rating exceed the 30 percent mark,” the KMT said.
In contrast, Tsai’s failure to give a clear response to allegations that she engaged in land speculation has taken a toll on her support rating, thus reducing the gap between the two candidates to single-digits, the KMT said.
The survey collected 1,069 valid samples from people aged 20 and above. It has a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
The results reflected only minor differences compared with the previous KMT poll released on Dec. 14, in which Tsai’s support rating stood at 39 percent, against Chu’s 29.4 percent.
Separately yesterday, the TVBS poll center released the results of its latest survey on the presidential election, which showed Tsai and her running mate, former Academia Sinica vice president Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁), with 46 percent support, ahead of Chu and his deputy, Jennifer Wang (王如玄), at 26 percent.
As for the presidential debates, 20 percent of respondents believed Tsai would outshine the other two candidates, followed by Soong at 14 percent and Chu at 12 percent.
A majority — 54 percent — said they could not predict who would deliver the best performance at the debates.
Asked which candidate would outperform in the vice presidential debate on Saturday, 27 percent rooted for Chen, while 11 percent picked Wang and 5 percent said they had faith in Soong’s running mate, Republic Party Chairperson Hsu Hsin-ying (徐欣瑩).
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