China's mainland is watching closely on the developments in the
leader election of Taiwan region, a spokesman with the Taiwan
Affairs Office of the State Council said Saturday.
The vote ended on Saturday, but one side of the candidates
claimed it was unfair and decided to file a lawsuit to nullify the
election, according to media in Taiwan.
"We are closely following the developments," said the spokesman
in response to a request for comment on the disputes in Taiwan
leader election.
Election of Taiwan authorities' leaders causes
disputes
The voting for the election of Taiwan authorities' leaders was
carried out across the island on Saturday.
According to the result released by the Taiwan election
authorities, Chen Shui-bian and Annette Lu, candidates for
Democratic Progressive Party, won 6,471,970 votes, or 50.11 percent
of the total; while Lien Chan and James Soong, of the coalition of
the Kuomintang and People First Party, won 49.89 percent of the
votes, totaling 6,442,452.
Lien and Soong made strong announcements immediately after the
election to call into question of the result, saying that "it was
an unfair election" and there were "numerous clouds of suspicions"
in the run-up to the election.
The coalition of Lien and Soong demanded that all the ballot
boxes be sealed up and said they were going to "file a petition to
nullify the election."
(Xinhua News Agency March 21, 2004)