Taiwanese opposition launches election challenge

Taiwan’s opposition today launched a new challenge to the March 20 presidential vote, asking the High Court to nullify the entire election and order another one.

The request by losing candidate Lien Chan was part of his two-pronged legal strategy to overturn President Chen Shui-bian’s narrow victory.

Lien and his Nationalist Party claim the vote was marred by irregularities and a mysterious election-eve shooting that wounded Chen.

Lien petitioned the High Court last week to order a recount – a move the president endorsed.

The two sides are negotiating the details of the re-tally, and were scheduled to discuss the process with the High Court on Wednesday.

Nationalist spokesman Alex Tsai told reporters that Lien today filed a petition with the High Court for a new election because the president “used fraud to gain power … and people will question the legality of his power in the next four years”.

One of Lien’s lawyers, Lee Fu-dan, added: “There were major violations of the law with this election, so we filed the petition according to the law.”

Lee argued that the president broke the law by holding a referendum on the same day as the presidential election.

The referendum focused on rival China’s missile threat and starting peace talks with the Communist neighbour.

The opposition has also alleged that the March 19 shooting that grazed Chen’s stomach and hit Vice President Annette Lu’s knee unfairly affected the election by giving Chen last-minute sympathy votes.

Chen won by a margin of 0.2%, or only 30,000 votes.