Ahead of a final committee meeting to review proposed constitutional amendments, members of several civic groups yesterday rallied outside the Legislative Yuan and criticized the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus for packaging two controversial proposals with others on which a consensus has been reached.
The protesters took issue with the KMT lumping proposals to lower the voting age to 18 and to lower the threshold for a party to gain legislator-at-large seats with more controversial proposals on absentee voting and reinstating the legislature’s right to vote on the president’s appointment of a premier.
Wearing shackles to symbolize that they were “hostages of the KMT’s reprehensible” power-play, the protesters accused the KMT of hijacking the first two proposals — upon which a general consensus has been reached — in the hopes that the other two, which only the KMT has endorsed, could also be passed.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Green Party Taiwan co-convener Lee Ken-cheng (李根政) said that he is against what he called the KMT’s make-or-break approach of combining unrelated bills.
The public has a right to constitutional reforms and the KMT should not try to boost its political power through legislation, he said.
Lowering the electoral threshold for small parties to secure representation in the legislature through legislator-at-large seats — currently set at 5 percent — would provide fairer access to the legislature, and the KMT has shown that it is insincere about constitutional reform by exploiting the issue, he said.
The KMT wants the legislature to have the right to approve a premier only because it fears it will lose political influence after next year’s presidential and legislative elections, he said.
It just wants to maintain a level of control over the nation’s politics, Lee said.
Constitutional amendment bills passed before Tuesday next week are to be put to a referendum held concurrently with next year’s elections, which would be significant for Taiwan’s democracy, Lee added.
The KMT should explain to the public what it sees as the connections between the voting age and absentee voting proposals and why it insists on packaging these issues together, he said.
Economic Democracy Union director Lai Chung-chiang (賴中強) said the KMT is taking advantage of the popular demand for lowering the voting age and the threshold for legislator-at-large seats for its own political gains and to supply ammunition during the KMT’s negotiations with opposition parties.
Taiwan Democracy Watch director Chen Chun-hung (陳俊宏) said that the KMT should not put absentee voting at the constitutional level, since the age restriction can be addressed by amending the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法).
The Constitution should outline the principles of the nation’s judicial system, not define the details of lesser laws, Chen said.
The KMT wants to pass the bill because it sees the majority of Taiwanese businesspeople working in China as potential KMT supporters, he said.
Given the sensitive relationship between Taiwan and China, absentee voting could compromise the nation’s electoral system, Chen said.
As the mechanism often involves voting carried out by proxies or by communication systems such as the Internet, there is no telling who actually cast the vote, he said.
An ill-planned absentee voting system could give Beijing influence over Taiwan’s politics and could lead to far-reaching consequences if Beijing decides to rig the elections, he said.
The issue of absentee voting requires more discussion between authorities and the public, so a bill allowing it should not be arbitrarily passed, Chen said.
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