Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has taken a small lead over President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) ahead of the presidential election, in a poll by a local TV stationS.
In the poll released yesterday by TVBS, Tsai and her running mate, Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全), lead their Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) counterparts, Ma and Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義), at 47.3 percent versus 45.8 percent.
Poll results ahead of the Jan. 14 presidential election were calculated in accordance with both decided voters and about 14 percent of undecided voters, said the station, which is generally perceived as sympathetic to the KMT.
In decided voter support, the Ma-Wu ticket enjoyed only a narrow advantage over the Tsai-Su ticket, at 39 percent versus 38 percent. People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) received 9 percent support, the poll suggested.
The results gave Tsai the lead in the presidential race over Ma for the first time in the station’s polls since May, when she was formally nominated as the DPP presidential candidate.
In the station’s poll on May 30, Ma led Tsai with 46 percent against her 42 percent. In the previous poll in September, support for Ma remained at about 46 percent, while Tsai received only 38 percent support.
Commenting on the TVBS poll, Ma’s re-election campaign office spokesperson Ma Wei-kuo (馬瑋國) said that the camp took every survey result into consideration. She declined to say whether the falling support rate for the Ma-Wu ticket reflected public disappointment with recent government performance.
She said the camp would stick to its campaign strategy and continue to promote Ma and the government’s achievements in the past three years ahead of the January vote.
Meanwhile, according to the latest information from xFuture, a Web site with a platform similar to a stock market exchange that allows users to predict the results of future events, Tsai’s lead over Ma is widening.
On Thursday, the exchange predicted Tsai would receive 49.9 percent of votes, Ma would get 46.1 percent and Soong would take 7.5 percent. On the probability of winning the election, the exchange gave Tsai 47 percent, Ma 42.8 percent and Soong 12.4 percent.
The exchange last Saturday predicted that Tsai would receive 49.5 percent of votes, Ma would get 48.3 percent and Soong would take 7.5 percent. On the probability of an electoral victory, the exchange gave Tsai 44.8 percent, Ma 41.5 percent and Soong 13.5 percent.
According to National Chengchi University’s Prediction Markets Center, prediction markets efficiently collect effective information through a futures or stock-trading mechanism that relies on the wisdom of the public, who buy and sell contracts of future events on the market.
Additional reporting by staff writer
‘TAIWAN-FRIENDLY’: The last time the Web site fact sheet removed the lines on the US not supporting Taiwanese independence was during the Biden administration in 2022 The US Department of State has removed a statement on its Web site that it does not support Taiwanese independence, among changes that the Taiwanese government praised yesterday as supporting Taiwan. The Taiwan-US relations fact sheet, produced by the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, previously stated that the US opposes “any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means.” In the updated version published on Thursday, the line stating that the US does not support Taiwanese independence had been removed. The updated
‘CORRECT IDENTIFICATION’: Beginning in May, Taiwanese married to Japanese can register their home country as Taiwan in their spouse’s family record, ‘Nikkei Asia’ said The government yesterday thanked Japan for revising rules that would allow Taiwanese nationals married to Japanese citizens to list their home country as “Taiwan” in the official family record database. At present, Taiwanese have to select “China.” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the new rule, set to be implemented in May, would now “correctly” identify Taiwanese in Japan and help protect their rights, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. The statement was released after Nikkei Asia reported the new policy earlier yesterday. The name and nationality of a non-Japanese person marrying a Japanese national is added to the
AT RISK: The council reiterated that people should seriously consider the necessity of visiting China, after Beijing passed 22 guidelines to punish ‘die-hard’ separatists The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has since Jan. 1 last year received 65 petitions regarding Taiwanese who were interrogated or detained in China, MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday. Fifty-two either went missing or had their personal freedoms restricted, with some put in criminal detention, while 13 were interrogated and temporarily detained, he said in a radio interview. On June 21 last year, China announced 22 guidelines to punish “die-hard Taiwanese independence separatists,” allowing Chinese courts to try people in absentia. The guidelines are uncivilized and inhumane, allowing Beijing to seize assets and issue the death penalty, with no regard for potential
‘UNITED FRONT’ FRONTS: Barring contact with Huaqiao and Jinan universities is needed to stop China targeting Taiwanese students, the education minister said Taiwan has blacklisted two Chinese universities from conducting academic exchange programs in the nation after reports that the institutes are arms of Beijing’s United Front Work Department, Minister of Education Cheng Ying-yao (鄭英耀) said in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) published yesterday. China’s Huaqiao University in Xiamen and Quanzhou, as well as Jinan University in Guangzhou, which have 600 and 1,500 Taiwanese on their rolls respectively, are under direct control of the Chinese government’s political warfare branch, Cheng said, citing reports by national security officials. A comprehensive ban on Taiwanese institutions collaborating or
RSS