TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — As the 2024 presidential election approaches, Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) led in a poll for the first time this election cycle. 

Ko received 33% of support from potential voters in a poll by TVBS, with results published on Sunday (June 18). Ko was three points ahead of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate Lai Ching-te (賴清德), who had 30% of the vote, and ten points ahead of Kuomintang (KMT) candidate Hou Yu-ih (侯友宜), who received 23%.



The national poll was conducted using landlines and mobile phones between June 14 and June 16, with a sample of 1,237 people over the age of 20. Among respondents, 14% did not express any opinion on their choice of candidate.

Surprisingly, since the last TVBS poll in May, Ko’s support had increased 10%, while the KMT’s Hou had lost 7% of support.

Some pundits have referred to the poll results as reflective of the “Ann Kao effect,” in reference to the election of the current mayor of Hsinchu, Ann Kao, a member of Ko’s TPP who was elected in November 2022 in what many called an upset victory.

Tsai Cheng-yuan (蔡正元), a former director of the KMT’s Policy Committee, said the “Ann Kao effect” occurred because the KMT waited until mid-May to announce their candidate. According to Tsai, in the eyes of many voters given a month to assess their options, Ko, the third party candidate, is now preferable to Lai, who reflects the current administration, and Hou, whose performance on the national stage has been underwhelming, UDN quoted. 



For Lai and the DPP, the TVBS poll with Ko in the lead by 3% may be seen as an outlier within the margin of error. However, for the KMT and Hou, the poll is only more bad news on top of a string of poor performances in the polls. In a piece written prior to the release of Sunday’s TVBS poll, political analyst Courtney Donovan Smith observed that Hou’s “presidential campaign is collapsing.”

While there have already been rumblings within the KMT to replace Hou, Tsai, a KMT insider, has again raised the prospect. Tsai said that if Hou’s poll numbers do not rebound, he may be replaced as the KMT nominee in the coming months.