Lee launches constitution campaign

Lee Hung-hsi, one of President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) top constitutional advisors, yesterday said Chen's constitutional revision plan is not at odds with Lee's plan to create a constitution.

"Chen is a pragmatic person. He knows that by amending the constitution, he could plead for the support of the opposition parties in a more humble way. His promise to give the people a new constitution by 2008 is the same as Lee's. It's just because he is the president and has to be careful about international pressure and the opinions of opposition leaders that he has to be a bit diplomatic in his [words]," Lee Hung-hsi said.

However, a prominent KMT figure, Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平), yesterday said there would be little room for creating a new constitution since Chen has already declared he only wanted to amend the existing Constitution, and the pan-blue camp also would only support an amendment in the new legislature after the December legislative elections.