Taipei Times
Date: Mar 29, 2017
By: Chen Wei-han / Staff reporter

The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is considering not putting forward candidates for next year’s mayoral and councilor elections in some constituencies, in favor of forging alliances with DPP-friendly independent candidates, in a bid to prevent the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) winning seats, a report said yesterday.

The DPP is considering not fielding candidates for the mayoral election in Taipei and Miaoli, as well as in Kinmen County, to make room for DPP-friendly candidates who it views as more likely to win those seats, including Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), Miaoli Mayor Chiu Ping-kun (邱炳坤) and Kinmen County Commissioner Chen Fu-hai (陳福海), a report in the Chinese-language Apple Daily said.

In the Taipei race, the DPP is planning to conduct opinion polls on a possible candidate’s chances against Ko before deciding whether the party should nominate its own candidate, the report said.

In the run-up to 2014’s Taipei mayoral election, DPP Legislator Pasuya Yao (姚文智) won the primary, but gave up the candidacy to support Ko’s campaign. Ko had higher approval ratings than Yao in polls, resulting in an alliance between the DPP and Ko, an independent.    [FULL  STORY]