On Nov. 22, the Hsinchu District Court convicted Lo Chi-hsiang (羅吉祥), the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) mayor of Hsinchu County’s Jhudong Township (竹東), on charges of vote-buying. It gave him a prison term of three years and 10 months, and deprived him of his civil rights for four years. Upon conviction, Lo was dismissed from office in accordance with the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法).
The Local Government Act (地方制度法) does say that county governments can appoint an acting mayor when a township mayor is suspended or dismissed from office, but the Hsinchu County Government used this power to designate Lo’s wife, Chang Shun-peng (張順朋), as Jhudong’s acting mayor. She took office on Nov. 29.
The county government said it made the move because Chang has considerable leadership and administration experience, is familiar with township affairs and can continue Lo’s policies.
The decision shows the county government’s strong support for a mayor mired in a vote-buying scandal. The county keeps telling everyone to reject vote buying, but it is reaffirming the policy achievements of a mayor who engaged in the practice.
The county’s message seems to be that it does not matter that Lo won his seat by election fraud, and that as long as the county supports him, someone from his circle can become acting mayor. What kind of a legal system produces such a ridiculous result?
The problem is that the Local Government Act only stipulates that “where the mayor of a ... township/city ... is removed from office ... the county government shall appoint an acting mayor.”
The act does allow the local government to exercise administrative discretion when appointing a mayor, but if a law’s implementation can lead to a result as absurd as allowing the spouse of a dismissed mayor to become acting mayor, then the law needs to be reviewed.
The Ministry of the Interior has officially interpreted this power as follows: “For the advancement of local government affairs, when a county government evaluates and appoints an acting mayor, it is advisable for it to assign a person of equivalent rank or who has a sufficient degree of administrative experience.”
The ministry used the language “it is advisable,” rather than “it should,” which is why the county could appoint Chang, although she lacks equivalent rank and administrative experience.
Even a Hsinchu County councilor can only call on the Legislative Yuan to amend the Local Government Act by qualifying such appointments with objective conditions, such as credentials and experience.
Although local powers of self-governance are important, they do no good if allowed to devolve into tools for political parties to consolidate their interests. Attaching objective conditions would be one way to safeguard proper township governance.
Joy Lien is a lawyer and a New Power Party Hsinchu County councilor.
Translated by Julian Clegg
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