Absentee voting would severely strain agency: officialDOUBTS REMAIN: The ‘secrecy’ of off-island voting in indigenous peoples’ areas has been compromised in the past, and absentee voting might have the same problemBy Lee Wen-hsin and Jake Chung / Staff reporter, with staff writerAbsentee voting would severely increase the workload of the electoral affairs agency, Deputy Minister of the Interior Wu Tang-an (吳堂安) said yesterday, instead voicing support for a proposal to make voting day and the preceeding day a national holiday. The Taiwan People’s Party’s proposal of absentee voting, proposed on Dec. 12 last year, could undergo a third reading as soon as next week. The Democratic Progressive Party on Nov. 28 last year introduced a bill that would set voting day and the day before as national holidays to encourage voting. The absentee voting system might compromise secrecy, he said, adding that external forces might influence people to apply for absentee voting in a specific area and undermine the fairness of elections. Making the pre-voting day a mandatory holiday would be preferable to introducing absentee voting, as it would not change the system, Chen said.

Source: Taipei Times January 08, 2026 16:05 UTC