After announced his running mate last Thursday, the priority for independent presidential candidate James Soong (宋楚瑜) is now his impending signature drive.
Analysts have said that if Soong can maintain his popularity at its current level of around 30 percent and collect a million signatures, then a `bandwagon effect' may take place and give an early impetus to the KMT maverick's campaign.
According to a bulletin from the Ministry of the Interior's Central Election Commission, the initial stage for handling paperwork related to the signature drive is from tomorrow to Nov. 20.
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The official beginning of the signature drive is scheduled from Nov. 23 to Jan. 6. Independent presidential candidates, unlike those from major political parties, are required to collect 224,429 signatures in order to stand in the elections.
Following rounds of consultations with campaign officials, Soong decided yesterday to register his presidential candidate status with the central electoral committee on Nov. 20.
On the same day, an association for Soong's supporters in Taipei is also planning a large-scale campaign rally of all supporters to formally introduce Soong's running partner -- Chang Keng University President Chang Chao-hsiung (張昭雄).
Despite repeated threats from KMT headquarters that the party would discipline members who joined Soong's signature drive, Soong's campaign officials were optimistic, saying pressure from the KMT would not prevent them from achieving their goal.
Soong broke with party ranks and launched his independent presidential bid after the KMT refused to nominate him, instead favoring Vice President Lien Chan (3s戰).
The Soong campaign official, who asked not to be mentioned by name, said yesterday that long before the 921 earthquake, Soong had already started to test his signature drive capacity.
"Our signature gathering is over the lowest requirement," the official said, "I expect our signature drive to accumulate at least one million."
When asked about the exact date on which the KMT planned to expel Soong from the party, the chairman of the party's evaluation and disciplinary committee, Chien Wei-chang (?維31), yesterday still sounded undecided.
"Personally, I had hoped to solve the so-called Soong question as soon as possible, however my superiors have other kinds of considerations. So far, they haven't asked me to punish anybody yet," Chien said.
Analysts said that if Soong kept his leading position in both the opinion polls and on a grass-root support level, the KMT's politicians would be forced to take sides -- and the bandwagon effect would be magnified.
"The signature drive is the best opportunity for Soong to test his grass-root mobilization capability. Once Soong has garnered more than one million signatures he has proved he is capable of reaching all the way down to the township level,'' said Kenneth Lin (林|V愷), an economics professor at National Taiwan University.
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