President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) approval rating has plunged to about 25 percent, although less than 30 percent of Taiwanese would like to see her removed from office, a poll published by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) said yesterday.
The poll, conducted by TrendGo Survey Research Co between Friday and Sunday at the behest of the KMT, showed that 25.7 percent of the respondents were satisfied with Tsai’s performance, compared with 61.5 percent who were not.
Despite Tsai’s high disapproval rating, only 28.9 percent of those polled supported removing her from office, while 59.4 percent were opposed, the survey said.
Asked if opposition parties should put forward a recall motion to assert pressure on the Tsai administration, regardless of the slim chance of it being passed at a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)-controlled legislature, 57.4 percent of the respondents agreed, while about 33 percent disagreed and 9 percent declined to answer.
“The gap between Tsai’s high disapproval rating and the low percentage of respondents wanting to see her recalled suggests that Taiwanese are gentle and kind-hearted and that they are willing to give her another chance,” KMT Culture and Communications Committee deputy director Hu Wen-chi (胡文琦) told a news conference in Taipei.
Hu said the KMT would listen to the public and push for recall motions against DPP lawmakers “who fail to represent the public opinion,” urging voters to keep Tsai’s problematic policymaking in check by supporting the KMT in next year’s local elections.
Asked about their political affiliation, 45.4 percent of the respondents said they were politically neutral, followed by 23.4 percent who identified with the KMT and 15.6 percent who support the DPP.
“These figures indicate that Taiwanese are moving toward a middle ground,” Hu said, adding that the KMT would step up efforts to appeal to grassroots voters.
Turning to a controversial draft national security and counterintelligence bill submitted by the Ministry of Justice’s Investigation Bureau, 50.3 percent of those polled regarded the act as “green terror,” against 29.5 percent who thought otherwise.
The proposal, which was rejected by the Executive Yuan in January, has sparked controversy over the authority it would give government agencies, prompting some to say it harkened to the White Terror era.
The poll collected 1,069 valid samples and has a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
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