The Legislative Yuan yesterday approved Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation chairman Michael You (游盈隆) as Central Election Commission (CEC) chairman in a roll call vote, alongside four other nominees.
You, who has no official political affiliation, was nominated by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and approved by a unanimous vote.
China University of Science and Technology vice president Lee Li-chung (李禮仲), Fooyin University professor Su Jia-hong (蘇嘉宏) and Soochow University professor Su Tzu-chiao (蘇子喬) were also approved as CEC members.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
The appointments restore the CEC’s ability to function ahead of the Nov. 28 local elections.
The CEC had been unable to convene or pass resolutions as it only had four commissioners — one short of the quorum required by law.
The Cabinet in December last year said it had submitted a list of seven nominees to the Legislative Yuan.
About 112 of the 113 lawmakers collected a ballot yesterday morning, Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) said.
DPP lawmakers voted in favor of all nominees, while lawmakers from the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) supported only You, Lee, Su Chia-hung and Su Tzu-chiao, the ballot results showed.
Soochow University law professor Hu Po-yen’s (胡博硯) nomination as vice chairman was rejected, as was former lawmaker Huang Wen-ling’s (黃文玲) bid for commissioner, with neither securing a majority vote.
Cabinet spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) said DPP lawmakers voted in favor of three nominees that the opposition backed, but did not see their goodwill reciprocated.
You was the only nominee to secure a confirmation without being named by the opposition, while the credentials of the nominees favored by the opposition showed a lack of knowledge and expertise, she said.
The confirmations again demonstrate that the legislature is no longer capable of making rational decisions about government appointments based on the candidates’ qualifications, Lee said.
You’s appointment as CEC chairman puts the veteran pollster in the spotlight for several high-profile matters the body is expected to deal with in the immediate future.
Notably, the CEC would be involved in the controversy surrounding TPP Legislator Li Zhenxiu (李貞秀), who the government has accused of illegally running for office while officially retaining Chinese citizenship and residency.
The new chairman would also be tasked with implementing opposition-backed amendments to the Referendum Act (公投法) that authorize concurrently held plebiscites and elections, a practice blamed in the past for long lines that exposed voters to broadcasts of ballot counts.
Should the KMT-TPP coalition succeed in its bid to amend the Public Official Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法), You would also have to enact absentee voting.
He had previously opposed the measure, saying that allowing absentee ballots could significantly complicate vote counting, which are conducted by hand in Taiwan.
You graduated with a doctorate in political science from the University of North Carolina in the US and had served in a variety of government posts, including as a CEC member and deputy minister of the Mainland Affairs Council.
He joined the DPP in 1995, and two years later oversaw the party’s use of polling to determine the nomination of political candidates, achieving renown as a trailblazer in internal polling methods.
You was a long-term ally and campaign adviser to former DPP president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), who called You “an oracle in predicting polling numbers.”
He left the DPP in 2019 after publicly dissenting from its leadership’s decision to change its stance from pursuing Taiwanese independence to maintaining the “status quo,” and to back the decoupling of referendums from elections.
You said in a statement explaining his departure that he had considered these issues core to the identity of the DPP, and that he believed the changes were a betrayal of its values and supporters.
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