Both the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday said they would not support a constitutional amendment to increase the number of legislative seats from 113 to 164 after the legislature is halved next year.
According to a constitutional amendment passed in August 2004, the number of legislative seats will be halved from 225 seats to 113 seats and a new "single-member district, two-vote" electoral system will be adopted in legislative elections next year.
However, some legislators in the pan-green and pan-blue camps plan to jointly propose a constitutional amendment that would increase the number of legislative seats from 113 to 164, change the "single-member district, two-vote system" into a "multi-member district" system and adopt a parliamentary system of government.
"Constitutional reforms cannot regress and the DPP will not agree to this amendment unless there is a tenable reason for it," DPP Chairman Yu Shyi-kun said yesterday.
Yu said that although the constitutional amendments passed in 2004 had not been implemented, legislators had voted for them, and it was inappropriate and illegitimate to undo them now.
"If any DPP legislators support this amendment, we will punish them according to party regulations," Yu said.
DPP legislative caucus head Yeh Yi-jin (
"We will not support it just because the legislative election is coming up. And most importantly, this amendment does not meet the public's expectations, and will make people feel lawmakers are self-interested," Yeh said.
Yeh said that although President Chen Shui-bian (
"It is nonsense for some newspapers to hint that it was the president who facilitated this amendment," Yeh said.
Meanwhile, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (
"The KMT has always opposed a constitutional amendment at this stage. The legislature just cut the number of legislative seats two years ago. I don't think it's legitimate to change it again now," Ma said before presiding over a municipal meeting at Taipei City Hall.
In response to a plan by some KMT legislators to back the proposal, Ma said the move would "be spurned by our voters."
But he declined to say that the party would take disciplinary action against those legislators.
"The Constitution was passed two years ago by the legislature, and they thought [the number of legislative seats] was reasonable back then ... I don't know whether party legislators will present this proposal at this stage," he said.
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) held a different view.
Wang said yesterday that the lawmakers proposing the new amendment had sought his support, but he told them he needed to stay neutral on the issue.
"But I think the amendments of 2004 might have been passed too hastily. I urge everyone to look at this issue rationally and think about how to hammer out a governmental system that meets the country's needs," Wang said. "To be frank, 113 legislative seats are not enough for the Legislative Yuan to function."
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