Cash prizes are to be awarded this year to Taipei borough wardens who get their constituents to polling stations in an effort to increase voter turnout in the Nov. 29 elections, the Taipei City Government’s Department of Civil Affairs Commissioner Huang Lu Ching-ju (黃呂錦茹) said yesterday.
She made her remarks at a press conference alongside people representing immigrants and young voters, urging city residents of all backgrounds to vote. The department is responsible for the city’s election budget.
While Taipei’s voter turnout has historically been higher than that of most other cities and counties, apathy toward the mayoral candidates could hinder the department reaching its voter turnout goal of 71 percent, Huang said.
The previous mayoral election in 2009 had a 70.65 percent voter turnout, according to department statistics.
Huang said that next month, the department would provide cash rewards to borough wardens, borough administrative secretaries and district offices for increasing voter turnout in their respective boroughs or districts.
Borough chiefs and administrative secretaries would be given a supermarket gift card for NT$1,000 for each percentage point that voter turnout in their boroughs exceeds 71 percent, she said, adding that district offices which reach this goal would be given NT$10,000 to be divided among their workers.
She said that this would be the first time that such a financial reward for increasing voter turnout has been provided during a mayoral election.
National Taiwan University politics professor Wang Ye-li (王業立) yesterday said that while it was impossible to predict how effective the new measures would be at increasing the voting rate, any increase would likely benefit the campaign of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei mayoral candidate Sean Lien (連勝文).
Although voter affiliation in Taipei is strongly tilted toward the pan-blue camp, the KMT’s supporters have been apathetic about Lien’s candidacy, he said.
Democratic Progressive Party City Councilor Chien Yu-yen (簡余晏), the spokeswoman for independent Taipei mayoral candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), yesterday said “the majority of borough wardens belong to the KMT.”
“We call on the Taipei City Government to maintain neutrality and avoid excess executive intervention in the election,” she said, adding that the voting rate in normal democratic countries is about 50 percent, unless there is extreme political polarization.
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