TAIPEI - TAIWAN'S governing party was crushed in the weekend's presidential election by its own corruption and shallow ideology, press commentators here said.

Mr Ma Ying-jeou, the opposition Kuomintang's candidate, swept to a landslide victory with a little over 58 percent of the vote, almost 17 points ahead of Democratic Progressive Party chief Frank Hsieh.

'The Taiwanese people turned its back on the DPP government, which has abused its power to exploit national resources and split them among themselves in shameless collaboration with business groups,' China Times thundered in an editorial on Sunday.

It charged that the DPP had 'put its ideological beliefs before public interests... and the shallow ideology it has consistently played failed to solicit support any more'. The DPP favours independence for Taiwan and has labelled Chinese immigrants and their offspring as 'mainlanders', calling into question their loyalty to the island.

Mr Ma was born in Hong Kong to a Chinese official who had fled there from the mainland during the civil war, and later came to Taiwan in 1951.

The KMT, which had lost power on the mainland to the communists, set up in Taiwan and ruled it for half a century until it was finally ousted from power in 2000 by the DPP's Chen Shui-bian, who won the presidency.

'Now it has regained people's support in this bitterly fought contest,' the Liberty Times wrote.

'Ma's victory shows that the Taiwanese people are open-minded to accept a Hong Kong-born as their new leader through the democratic process.'

But the paper's editorial asked Ma, who favours closer ties with China, to exercise caution to ensure the self-ruled island would not be 'swallowed up' by its giant rival.

The United Daily News took a similar line to the China Times.

'Eight years of corrupted and ideological rule by the DPP government has divided the people and wasted time and resources,' it said.

'The DPP also needs to settle with Chen Shui-bian, culprit of the party's bitter defeat.'