TAIPEI: The ruling Kuomintang (KMT) will announce its nominees for the year-end mayoral elections in Taiwan's five special municipalities in March or April, KMT Secretary-General King Pu-tsung said yesterday.

Speaking at a working meeting of the party, King expressed his hope that the sooner the nominating process is completed the better, according to Lee Chien-jung, director of the KMT Cultural and Communication Affairs Committee.

King believes that it would be simpler for the KMT to nominate candidates than for the opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), because of the high number of DPP aspirants for the posts, but he said the KMT will also have to coordinate among those interested.

King agreed with the opinion of heads of some KMT local chapters throughout Taiwan that the party adopt a flexible nomination process, or produce the final nominees for mayoral elections and city councilor elections in differing ways.

"We will act according to local conditions," King said, adding that coordination, opinion polls or polls plus party member voting could all be adopted as means to produce the final nominees.

Meanwhile, the DPP agreed on Sunday to finalize its nominations for the special municipality races by the end of May and passed a set of regulations to govern the process.

DPP Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen said the year-end special municipality elections would be crucial, particularly those in municipalities not under DPP control.

Chinn Daily/CNA

(HK Edition 01/26/2010 page2)