The 2001 Kuomintang chairmanship election () was held on 24 March 2001 in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

. This was the first direct party leadership election in

Kuomintang The Kuomintang (KMT) is a major political party in the Republic of China (Taiwan). It was the one party state, sole ruling party of the country Republic of China (1912-1949), during its rule from 1927 to 1949 in Mainland China until Retreat ...

history in which all registered, due-paying party members were eligible to vote. In previous elections, only 2,000 high-ranking members could cast votes.

History

Lee Teng-hui Lee Teng-hui (; pinyin: ''Lǐ Dēnghuī''; 15 January 192330 July 2020) was a Taiwanese politician and agricultural scientist who served as the fourth president of the Republic of China, president of the Taiwan, Republic of China (Taiwan) unde ...

had assumed the

presidency A presidency is an administration or the executive, the collective administrative and governmental entity that exists around an office of president of a state or nation. Although often the executive branch of government, and often personified b ...

and Kuomintang chairmanship in 1988, after the death of

Chiang Ching-kuo Chiang Ching-kuo (, 27 April 1910 – 13 January 1988) was a politician of the Republic of China. The eldest and only biological son of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, he held numerous posts in the government of the Republic of China and ended ...

. With the help of

Lien Chan Lien Chan ( zh, t=連戰, w=, p=, poj=; born August 27, 1936) is a Taiwanese political scientist and politician. He was the chairman of the Taiwan Provincial Government from 1990 to 1993, premier of the Republic of China from 1993 to 1997, vice ...

, Lee had withstood a challenge to his leadership in 1997, shortly after the Kuomintang lost that year's local elections handily. In 2000, the Kuomintang lost the presidential election to

Democratic Progressive Party The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is a centre to centre-left Taiwanese nationalist political party in Taiwan. As the dominant party in the Pan-Green Coalition, one of the two main political camps in Taiwan, the DPP is currently the ...

candidate

Chen Shui-bian Chen Shui-bian ( zh, t=陳水扁; born 12 October 1950) is a Taiwanese former politician and lawyer who served as the fifth president of the Republic of China (Taiwan) from 2000 to 2008. Chen was the first president from the Democratic Progres ...

, and discontent over Lee's leadership had again broken out. He planned to resign the chairmanship in September, but eventually submitted his resignation on 24 March, after days of speculation and protest.

succeeded Lee as chairman in June. The first direct leadership election was scheduled for 24 March 2001. In previous elections, only 2,000 party representatives could vote for the office.

Election

Lien Chan registered for the election on 9 February 2001, and ran unopposed, as Tuan Hung-chun was declared ineligible. Lien was required to gather a petition of three percent of the party membership to validate his candidacy. He garnered 521,712 of 537,370 votes in the election itself, at a time when the Kuomintang had an eligible voter count of 928,175. Lien won 97.09% of all votes cast, a record that would stand until

2015 2015 was designated by the United Nations as: * International Year of Light * International Year of Soil __TOC__ Events January * January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...

, when

Eric Chu Eric Li-luan Chu (; born on 7 June 1961) is a Taiwanese politician, statistician, and academic who is currently the Chairman of the Kuomintang, chairman of the Kuomintang (KMT). Born into a political family with strong ties to the Kuomintan ...

was elected.

References

2001 elections in Taiwan March 2001 in Asia

2001 The year's most prominent event was the September 11 attacks against the United States by al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror. The United States led a Participan ...

Kuomintang chairmanship election Single-candidate elections {{Taiwan-poli-stub