Scuffles broke out at the legislature yesterday before Premier Lin Chuan (林全) was scheduled to brief legislators on the budget for the Forward-looking Infrastructure Development Program.
In one of the more dramatic moments Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsu Shu-hua (許淑華) slapped Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chiu Yi-ying (邱議瑩) across the face.
Legislators in the morning signed up to speak about the program during a legislative discussion preceding the first meeting of the second extraordinary legislative session, which began yesterday.
Photo: CNA
KMT secretary-general Lin Wei-chou (林為洲), the last KMT legislator to speak, gave KMT legislators a cue and they flocked to the front of the chamber to occupy the podium where Lin Chuan was scheduled to make his presentation.
Sounding air horns, blowing whistles and brandishing placards, KMT legislators said that the program, which has a budget of NT$420 billion (US$13.82 billion), would cause future generations to be mired in debt.
“Illegal budgeting. Block the review. Money-blowing premier. Lin Chuan step down,” they shouted.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
Legislative Speaker Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全) tried to quell the protest by admonishing the KMT legislators, but his efforts were in vain.
A skirmish broke out between Chiu and Hsu when Chiu approached the KMT legislators and began pulling at a microphone that KMT caucus vice secretary-general Lee Yen-hsiu (李彥秀) was holding.
Hsu — in an apparent attempt to separate the two — joined the fray and soon became entangled with Chiu.
Photo: Sam Yeh, AFP
Hsu slapped Chiu across the face. Chiu responded by pulling her hair.
The two were separated by their colleagues, but that did not stop Chiu from scuffling with other KMT legislators, including Lee, KMT caucus whip Lin Te-fu (林德福) and KMT Legislator Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順).
The KMT caucus formed a blockade around the podium, but Su attempted to let Lin Chuan make the presentation nonetheless, prompting KMT lawmakers start throwing brochures, water balloons and fake banknotes in the premier’s direction.
Seeing that the proceedings had been paralyzed, Su advised the premier to leave, before announcing that the meeting would be reconvened today.
Hsu later said that her actions were meant to protect Lee and were inadvertent, and that she would like to apologize to society.
She said that she would be mindful of her interactions with her DPP colleagues from now on, but refused to apologize to Chiu, who she said had acted in a “provocative” manner.
The KMT’s “barbaric” boycott “belittled the legislature and bullied Taiwan,” Chiu said on Facebook.
Following a halt in the proceedings, Su in the afternoon session hastily put the DPP’s proposed agenda to a vote, which secured the majority backing of the DPP caucus.
The issues to be discussed during the extraordinary session included the Cabinet’s budget proposals for projects under the Forward-looking Infrastructure Development Program and a proposed amendment to the Mining Act (礦業法).
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