DPP lacks strategy for legislature

The DPP's defeat in the election for legislative vice speaker on Friday highlighted the party's naivete in dealing with collaboration between the opposition parties, political observers said.

While the "pan-green" camp, consisting of the DPP and the fledgling Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU), holds 102 seats in the legislature, the "pan-blue" camp, comprising the KMT, People First Party (PFP) and New Party, holds 114 seats, a majority in the 225-seat legislature.

Political observers said the DPP's torpidity in formulating a counter-strategy before and after the elections may be a result of its lack of political experience or because members were awaiting directions from President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).

Despite the DPP's apparent goodwill in unanimously supporting legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng's (王金平) re-election bid, Wang never expressed a preference for his deputy. Nor did he reciprocate the goodwill by convincing his party colleagues that they should endorse the DPP's candidate for the vice-speakership, Hong Chi-chang (洪奇昌).

Although the DPP swallowed its pride by admitting failure after the race, it has not yet decided on a strategy to deal with confrontation in the legislature.

DPP Secretary-General Wu Nai-jen (吳乃仁) has ruled out the immediate creation of the "cross-party alliance for national stabilization" because, he said, the DPP would like to see political stability in the legislature.

"The main reason for us refraining from immediately launching the [alliance] after the Dec. 1 legislative election was because we'd really hate to see partisan confrontation become a feature of the legislature," Wu said.

"The same thinking applies to the elections [for legislative vice speaker] this time."

Wu said, however, that the alliance would be formed at an "appropriate time" in the future if necessary.

The "appropriate time," according to Wu, would be when the party was facing opposition to an important bill and the deadlock would cause damage to the public interest and create partisan confrontation.

The "cross-party alliance for national stabilization" was proposed by President Chen during the run-up to last year's legislative elections.

The proposed alliance would be a 120-member group of lawmakers that would support the government's policy initiatives and follow four objectives set down by the president.

The four objectives comprise: changing the electoral method to a single-member district, two-vote system; opposing any notion of "one country, two systems"; implementing the 322 conclusions reached by consensus at the Economic Development Advisory Conference; and realizing national social-welfare policies.

DPP lawmaker Lin Cho-shui (林濁水), of the party's New Tide faction, said that there is no immediate need to hammer out a counter-strategy following defeat in the vice-speakership race because the post of the vice speaker is not particularly important.

"If the party is to formulate a plan, it should be one that is well-thought-out for the long-term and is orchestrated and approved by the party's legislative whips," Lin said.

Although the party elected Hsu Jung-shu (許榮淑), Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) and Wang Tuoh (王拓) as the party's legislative whips on Feb. 1, the trio has not yet decided what each of their roles will be.

Outgoing DPP legislative whip Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯) said that the party's defeat in the vice-speakership race was mainly a result of Wang's reluctance to endorse Hong.