Taiwan took another stride toward full and effective democracy in January's election of city and county councilmen and village and township chiefs.
The election was the sixth for city and county councilmen and the fifth for village and township chiefs since Taiwan was retroceded to the Republic of China at the end of World War II.
Preparations for the voting began last November. Provincial government authorities met to review past elections and work out ways to assure economy, fairness, and adherence to the constitution.
Decision was reached to combine city-county and village-township balloting in order to save money. Candidates could run for a council seat or a chief's post but not both.
Statistics on the population of the five cities and 16 counties of Taiwan were reviewed. This led to fixing of 905 as the number of councilmen to be elected, 24 fewer than previously. The cut results from increasing urbanization. The law calls for a councilman for every 10,000 persons (5,000 in the case of aborigines) up to 300,000, then one for every 20,000 to 800,000, and only one for 50,000 above that figure.
Because women were emancipated and aborigines brought into contact with modern civilization only recently, their political rights continued to receive special protection. In the case of the council election, 85 seats were reserved for women and 46 for aborigines. Only aborigines can be elected in villages and towns with a predominantly aboriginal population.
Candidate Record
In December, local governments announced the names of eligible voters, totaling about 5.1 million. Minimum voting age is 20. Minimum age for a councilman is 23. For a village or township chief it is 25.
From December 12 to 31, 1,857 candidates for council seats and 741 for the 312 posts of village and township chiefs completed registration with election affairs offices set up in their districts. The number of candidates set a record. They came from the ruling Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) or were independents. The China Youth and Democratic Socialist Parties, which are divided by factionalism, did not enter nominees. However, some minority party members ran as independents and were elected.
Of Kuomintang candidates, half were nominated by their party and another half joined the race of their own accord. The Kuomintang has been refraining from nominating candidates for all local offices so as to promote freedom of candidacy among its members and freedom of choice among voters. Hsueh Jen-yang, chairman of the Taiwan Provincial Headquarters of the Kuomintang, said on December 30 that the party sought only to set a good example of campaign conduct and to encourage virtuous men to seek offices and to serve the nation.
Many independents were chosen by farmers' associations, trade guilds, and labor unions. Others were those who themselves thought they could represent the people well.
Ninety per cent of candidates were middle-aged. All had their own sources of income. Councilmen receive only small expense and attendance fees amounting to less than US$200 a year. Monthly pay for village and township chiefs is about US$30. Many holders of local office complain they are out of pocket for the expense of entertaining. A long-time Taipei city councilman, Huang Huan-yung, has said fees do not begin to cover the donations he is called upon to make at dinners, wedding parties, and other functions.
Colorful Campaign
In early January, the candidates drew lots for the numbers which would accompany their names on the ballots. From January 16 to 25, they conducted their campaigns.
The campaigning was colorful and energetic. Posters bearing the candidate's name, picture, and number were pasted on walls and poles. Some were mistakenly plastered across the openings of mailboxes. Oil paintings were used to illustrate the record of Chin Feng-Kang, an incumbent.
Candidates attended meetings and stumped on street corners and at market places. Their favorite topics were education, taxation, road construction, and sanitation.
Jeeps, decorated with portraits of candidates and slogans, roamed the streets, public address systems booming promises and pleas for votes. Limericks were fitted with candidates' names and chanted or sung to the Yellow Plum tune made popular by the hit motion picture "Love Eterne."
Chang Sze-yin decorated her campaign jeep with 40 red banners, her name and number on all of them. Her jeep swept the streets like a chariot of old, banners fluttering in the breeze.
Some candidates rode open jeeps in the company of their spouses, or sometimes their small children, who clasped their hands in the Chinese gesture of greeting to passersby.
Emotional Appeals
Others campaigned from pedicabs and bicycles. One candidate received the unlucky number of 13 in the drawing but took it as a good sport. He wore white sports clothes, his number, and did his canvassing afoot: He could have been mistaken for an Olympic Games torchbearer.
Posters bearing candidates' names, numbers, and portraits are pasted on Taiwan bamboo fence (File photo)
Candidates appealed to the emotions of voters. An example was the physician whose slogan was: "I am in mortal danger (of losing my seat) and need emergency treatment."
Some old hands maintained it was of little use to appeal to strangers. They visited relatives, schoolmates, friends, and colleagues.
Others stood on street corners and distributed their name cards to passersby. One candidate had name cards in one pocket and pep pills in another. In the flurry, he sometimes handed out pep pills instead of name cards.
Independents made a big to-do about their independence. They claimed to be "true independents", "independents of a tested brand", and "independents of long standing".
Campaigns ended at midnight January 25. No irregularities were reported during the 10-day period. Law provided campaigns should be conducted by the candidates and no more than three assistants. Formerly the number of assistants was 15. The cut was designed to save money and prevent irregularities.
January 26 dawned rainy and cold. A total of 5,453 polling places throughout the island opened at 8 a.m. Sites were schools, temples, and public buildings. Poll workers were advanced students, teachers, and civic leaders. Candidates' representatives kept watch.
Voters presented identity cards, which were stamped, and received ballots on which appeared the names, pictures, and numbers of candidates. Ballots were voted in secret, then deposited in a locked box.
Those casting ballots included a 94-year-old woman, the nuns of a mountain nunnery, the inhabitants of a Home for the Blind, and lighthouse attendants who sailed seven nautical miles in a sampan to a polling place in the Pescadores.
Few Incidents
Balloting ended at 5 p.m., one hour earlier than in previous elections. Unused ballots were sealed. Ballots were counted at the polling places where they were cast. Candidates' representatives watched.
Supported by granddaughter, 94-year-old casts vote (File photo)
Order and honesty were well maintained. One candidate in Taichung City and another in Changhua County were disqualified for continuing to campaign on election day. Voters and poll workers had a quarrel at Hsintien. These were the only incidents.
Returns were broadcast as the count proceeded. Candidates of the Kuomintang won 80 per cent of the council seats and 92 per cent of the village and township chief posts.
Among councilmen-elect, 122 were women. More than 60 per cent of them were re-elected incumbents.
The 312 village and township chiefs are all men. Only one woman ran for the office of magistrate and she lost. The lady mayor of Sanhsia Town, the only female town boss in Taiwan, who was married during her term of office, did not seek re-election. Instead, she sought election as a county councilwoman and won.
Seventy-three of the new village and township chiefs won unopposed. All had to poll more than a fourth of the ballots of eligible voters, as newly required by the law.
Taipei, the largest Taiwan city with a population of more than a million, had the lowest turnout of 60.02 per cent. Tainan City recorded the high of 83.59 per cent. The average of 77 per cent turnout was a seven per cent increase over that in the provincial assembly election in April, 1962.
New councilmen took office February 15 and village and township chiefs on March 1. Councilmen will serve a term of four years, a year longer than their predecessors. The term for the village and township chiefs is still three years.