Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) yesterday announced that he would run for chairman of the nation’s largest opposition party, pledging to draft Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) as the KMT’s presidential candidate in 2028.
Lo promised to nominate Lu within three months of next year’s local elections and then step down, supporting her to take over as chair.
He said that uniting the party under a single candidate is the only path to victory in the next presidential election.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
The KMT lost in 2016, 2020 and last year because multiple contenders weakened the party and benefited the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), he said.
He had proposed a “grand alliance for party rotation” with the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) before last year’s presidential election, but it was not adopted, leading to division in the opposition and enabling President William Lai (賴清德) of the DPP to win with 40 percent of the vote, he said.
Such division must not be repeated in next year’s elections or in 2028, Lo said.
He said he would again establish the alliance and create a system for regular consultations with the leader of the TPP.
The KMT and TPP would seek to deepen parliamentary cooperation, election cooperation that respected the TPP’s independence and “justice cooperation.”
As part of justice cooperation, Lo said he would encourage the creation of a “political persecution investigation committee,” adding that the KMT must make a key policy pledge on seeking redress for former TPP chairman and Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), detained on corruption and bribery charges, and Huang Lu Chin-ju (黃呂錦茹), a former head of the KMT’s Taipei branch office who this month pleaded guilty in a case related to forging signatures for recall petitions.
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