New Power Party (NPP) legislative candidate Freddy Lim (林昶佐) yesterday said that the party “leans toward” supporting Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文).
Lim said that Tsai’s policies were more in line with the NPP’s ideals compared with the sole contender in the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) primaries, KMT Legislator Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱).
“We will support the candidate who upholds similar views to our ideals and goals for the nation’s future,” Lim said.
Lim’s remarks came on the heels of comments made by political veteran Lin I-hsiung (林義雄) over the past week.
Lin, who is seen as an influential figure among “third force” political parties such as the NPP and the Social Democratic Party (SDP), stirred controversy when he launched a broadside attack on Tsai last week.
He said that the DPP should yield more seats to emerging parties to prevent the KMT from retaining a legislative majority and blasted Tsai’s platform of “maintaining the status quo” on cross-strait issues.
Meanwhile, Academia Sinica researcher Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌), who is considering a legislative bid on the NPP ticket, said that Tsai should emphasize that Taiwan is not a part of the People’s Republic of China during her visit to the US.
However, President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) uses the “status quo” to bring closer ties between Taiwan and China through economic and political means, Huang said, adding that this part of the “status quo” should be changed.
Additional reporting by Su Fan-ho
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