In an open letter to DPP members, Tsai said the party, which was routed in parliamentary and presidential elections last year, will transform itself into the locomotive for Taiwan's social progress in the new year.

"The year 2009," Tsai said, "is a critical year for the Democratic Progressive Party." The opposition party, which now controls only 27 of the 113 seats in the Legislative Yuan, will "take action" on self-renewal, national polity, economic development and relations between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, she told the party's rank-and-file.

She said the party will join with intellectuals and workers to turn the action into a "people's campaign" that will deepen Taiwan's democracy.

"We will break the cocoon to arise as an awe-inspiring party, moving forward so that we may do much better when the people return us to power the next time," Tsai pledged.

Tsai urged all party members who saw former President Chen Shui-bian apologize on August 14 for doing what the law doesn't allow, joined hand-in-hand to protest the misgovernment of the Kuomintang on August 30, and demanded President Ma Ying-jeou to step down on October 25, "to wipe dry all the tears and stand up after they have tripped and fallen."

They were also given assurances that their party will call a "national policy conference" and an "assembly of the unemployed" in the year 2009.