Turnout was 47 percent.

The winner collected 73,828 out of 122,701 votes cast, or 61.2 percent.

Koo, who garnered 48,873 votes, or 39.8 percent, conceded defeat.

It was a victory for the middle-of-the roaders among DPP supporters. They apparently shunned Koo, whose insistence on Taiwan independence was one of the causes of the party's two consecutive election fiascoes.

The Kuomintang won a virtual three-fourths majority in the Legislative Yuan in the elections on last Jan. 12. Ma Ying-jeou of the Kuomintang overwhelmingly defeated his DPP rival Frank Hsieh on March 22.

With Koo's defeat, the party that will formally be in opposition tomorrow heaved a collective sigh of relief that it would not split.

There were fears that Tsai's supporters in a coalition of three major factions would form splinters, if Koo were elected chairman of the party.

Two factions, headed by Yu Shyi-kun and Trong Chai, supported Koo. Yu is a former DPP chairman, who served once as premier. Chai is a veteran lawmaker and one of the heavyweights.

But Tsai, who served as a chairwoman of the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) from 2000 to 2004, will face a challenge of how to rally all members behind her to rebuild the all but down-and- out party.

It won't be easy.

At a joint press conference right after the election, Koo just formally conceded defeat and left, while his supporters protested it was an unfair election. Even Vice President Annette Lu said too many "ghost" members voted in the election. Ghost members are those who are card-carrying members who keep membership with dues paid by factional leaders.

"It certainly isn't an honor to win the election with many ghost members voting," the vice president said.

On the other hand, Chen Chu, mayor of Kaohsiung, issued a statement congratulating Tsai for her election, declaring it as the beginning of the party's much-awaited reform.

"Her victory," Chen said, "is one for a new generation with cross-factional support. We expect the new chair will improve all the defects found in the past eight years and start a party overhaul fairly and squarely."

What is needed is a new unity of purpose, said the mayor of Kaohsiung, who is now the party's highest public office holder.

Two more elections were held at the same time.

DPP members went to the polls to elect 23 city and county chapter chiefs and 368 delegates to a national party congress scheduled for July.

No exact dates have been fixed for the national congress, where 30 members of the party's executive council will be elected. Ten of them will then be elected to the DPP's powerful central standing committee.

Frank Hsieh will step down as acting chairman of the party next Monday. Tsai takes over and will preside over the July party congress, where leaders of the old guard, including President Chen Shui-bian and his former premier Su Tseng-chang, are fielding their proxies for the executive council.

Su ran for vice president on Hsieh's ticket. Chen wants to remain a power behind the scenes after he steps down tomorrow.

The first task facing Tsai is how to get a well-balanced executive council elected in the party's forthcoming national congress.