Director of the Democratic Progressive Party's (DPP) policy committee Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) yesterday said that the Presidential Office will not give in to pan-blue camp demands to submit a new nomination list for the Control Yuan to their caucuses. He added that the DPP caucus will make the approval of the nominations a top priority when the new legislative session begins on Friday.
"The Constitution stipulates that the Legislative Yuan has the authority to exercise the right to approve new Control Yuan members," said Ker, who is also a DPP legislator. "However, the legislature did not deal with the nominations before the last legislative session ended," and so it's unreasonable for the legislature to now send back the president's nominations or ask the president to renominate, Ker said.
The pan-blue camp has been uncooperative on approving President Chen Shui-bian's (
The pan-blue camp questioned the eligibility of the nominees and asked Chen to withdraw his nominations and submit new ones.
The Presidential Office refused to follow that request, and so the Legislative Yuan did not approve the nominations before the end of the last legislative session late last month.
"The Presidential Office will not submit a new nomination list for the Control Yuan members in the new legislative session that will begin on Friday," Ker said firmly yesterday.
He added that the DPP will demand that caucus arrange the approval of the Control Yuan nominations as its top priority in legislative negotiations and finish the job as soon as possible.
Ker said that the pan-blue legislators took advantage of their majority in the legislature and boycotted the approval process, which has once again caused disorder in the legislature and led to a constitutional crisis since the new members of the Control Yuan have not been sworn in.
The new Control Yuan members were supposed to assume their offices on Feb. 1.
"If the pan-blue camp was not satisfied with the name list, it could have vetoed the slate. But it can't simply boycott it," Ker said.
Since Chen and People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Tseng Yung-chuan (
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