Latest update February 17th, 2019 12:00 AM
Over half of Taiwan voters indifferent to political parties: poll
Taipei, More than 50 percent of Taiwanese voters do not care which political parties are vying for local government executive and council seats in November, according to a poll released Monday.
At a press conference, Taiwan Competitiveness Forum (TCF) said its recent polls found that 51.7 percent of voters were indifferent -- a slight drop from 52.8 percent in February.
The poll conducted July 22-24 across the nation showed that the main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) was the most popular party, with a support rate of 23.1 percent, followed by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) with 14.6 percent, the minor opposition New Power Party (NPP) with 6 percent, and People First Party (PFP) with 2.9 percent.
All the other political parties were struggling with less than 1 percent of support rate, namely the Green Party (0.8 percent), New Party (0.5 percent), Taiwan Solidarity Union (0.3 percent) and Minkuotang (0.1 percent), according to the poll.
The survey showed that the KMT's support rate rose 4 percent from February, while the DPP's dropped 3.5 percent, with the biggest shifts occurring in Taoyuan, Hsinchu, Miaoli, Yilan, Hualien and Taitung, areas that TCF said the KMT are likely to win in the Nov. 24 elections.
TFC said the survey was conducted via telephone among 1,081 people aged 20 and over in Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu. It had a confidence level of 95 percent and a margin of error of plus or minus 2.98 percentage points.
Meanwhile, more than half (57 percent) of the Taiwanese public thinks there is need for a viable third party in the country, 36 percent oppose that view, and 9 percent has no opinion on the issue, according to a poll conducted by Public Opinion Foundation July 9-11.
Taiwan is to hold elections on Nov. 24 for mayors of its six special municipalities, local government heads of 22 counties and cities, 375 municipal councilors, and 532 county and city councilors.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel
