Taiwan’s opposition nationalists, who favour closer ties with China, on Saturday declared a landslide victory in legislative elections, claiming to have won more than two-thirds of the seats.

The Kuomintang (KMT) and its smaller allies have secured 86 of the 113 seats in the island’s new parliament, KMT chairman Wu Poh-hsiung told a press conference at party headquarters. Minutes later, President Chen Shui-bian conceded defeat and said he would resign as chairman of his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), calling the defeat the “worst setback” in his party’s history. Taiwan’s central election commission has not yet released any official results. If confirmed, the KMT’s score would deal a devastating blow to the party led by Chen.

The resounding win also would give a major boost to KMT presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou in the run-up to the March 22 presidential elections. Chen has been blamed for both raising tensions with China and failing to revive Taiwan’s sluggish tech-heavy economy -- the two issues that have dominated both the parliamentary campaign and the race for the presidency.