Judiciary chief remains upbeat on reform of the system

Taipei Times: Regarding the recent VCD released by `Scoop Weekly' that depicts an alleged sexual encounter between former New Party Taipei City councilor Chu Mei-feng (璩美鳳) and her married lover, the magazine claimed that it was exercising freedom of the press. However, in exercising their freedom they also appear to have violated human rights and privacy. Do we have any law to protect our human rights and privacy?

Weng Yueh-sheng (翁岳生): Well, actually, we do. Other than articles 235, 310 and 315-2 of the Criminal Code and articles 18 and 195 of the Civil Code, we also have the Law for the Protection of Computer-managed Personal Information. Despite the name, it is actually like the Privacy Law in the US. These laws are quite new and were recently amended or created. Protecting privacy has become something that every country in the world is working on, especially privacy on the Internet.

TT: Are there any particular difficulties you've encountered in reforming the judiciary since you took office two years ago?

Weng: Yes, communication. Good communications between government bodies are very important, especially when you are reforming a system. It is very easy for us in the Judicial Yuan to come up with a solution and work hard for it. However, it is very difficult to ask everybody to agree on the same issue. As a result, communication is an important factor in judicial reform.

The second challenge is getting final approval in the Legislative Yuan. Everybody knows that there are always a lot of bills to be reviewed and passed in the Legislative Yuan. Sometimes we had to wait for months, even years, for a new proposal to become a law. But we have been doing our best and will keep doing so.

TT: What do you do when you discover that political considerations may have affected the outcome of a case?

Weng: In the past, when a judge reached a verdict, he had to send the verdict to the Judicial Yuan president for final approval. But that is no longer the case. A lot of people do not believe that our judiciary has been totally independent. A true independent judicial system means that a judge can work without any outside pressure or political influence. In those terms, we can be very proud to say that we have succeeded.

However, we do worry that some judges lack experience even when they are not under political pressure. That is what we are working on. We are also encouraging judges to expand their knowledge.

TT: About two weeks ago, the Judicial Reform Foundation (民間司法改革基金會) released this year's evaluation survey of judges by Taipei and Tainan lawyers. These lawyers urged the government to evaluate the judges to make the judicial system fairer. What is your view?

Weng: It is good advice. Both judges and lawyers need to be evaluated annually. I always encourage judges not to worry and regard it as a reference. It is no big deal to be open-minded and accept criticism from the public. A judge should be able to live with that. Nowadays, even students evaluate their teachers every year. I agree that positive criticism will make one grow.

TT: What inspired you to devote yourself to the law?

Weng: I have loved studying for a long time, probably since I was a child. At that time, there weren't that many universities and colleges in Taiwan. I always wanted to keep on studying but my family was too poor to help me fulfill my dream. When I was in the third grade, I learned the story of former US president Abraham Lincoln from my teacher, Hu Hsian-te (胡先德). I realized that he studied very hard to become a lawyer and helped a lot of black slaves.