Assembly set to open on Monday

Amid bickering, delegates of the newly-elected National Assembly yesterday agreed to meet on Monday to start the process of ratifying a constitutional amendment package passed by the legislature last August.

Yesterday's cross-party meeting also settled on the composition of the 11-member steering committee and elected an acting secretary-general, who will be replaced when a formal secretary-general is selected by the full committee.

Although the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) originally nominated Research, Development and Evaluation Commission Minister Yeh Chun-jung (葉俊榮) for the post, it ended up supporting Chien Lin Whei-jun (錢林慧君), the convener of the Taiwan Solidarity Union's (TSU) National Assembly caucus.

The committee vote was 6 to 5 in favor of Chien Lin over People First Party (PFP) candidate Edward Chen (陳一新) after two rounds of voting.

The composition of the committee itself was decided upon by Assembly delegates from 11 parties and civic groups, who agreed to meet on Monday.

Although the National Assembly cannot sit for longer than one month, Chang Ya-chung (張亞中), a political science professor and leader of a civic alliance that won five assembly seats, proposed to meet for only one day to save taxpayers' money.

An assembly member will earn about NT$7,000 a day for the month.

Chang's proposal was supported by most parties, including the DPP and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), which together will occupy more than 80 percent of assembly seats.

Both parties agreed to finish the session as quickly as possible but failed to specify how long this would be.

Taiwan Independence Party delegate Lin Chih-sheng (林志昇), however, opposed making a "hasty decision on such a significant matter."

The parties allocated five of the steering committee's 11 places to the DPP, which secured 127 seats in the 300-member assembly; four to the KMT, which gained 117 seats; one to the TSU for its 21 seats; and one to the PFP for its 18 seats.

The DPP committee members are Senior Presidential Adviser Yeh Chu-lan (葉菊蘭), Presidential Adviser Lee Yuan-chen (李元貞), former legislator Chou Ching-yu (周清玉), attorney Wellington Koo (顧立雄) and Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission Minister Hsu Chih-hsiung (許志雄).

The KMT's members are Chen Chin-jang (陳金讓), Tsai Cheng-wen (蔡政文), National Taiwan University professor of politics Ger Yeong-kuang (葛永光) and the National Policy Foundation's Chao Li-yun (趙麗雲).

Former president Lee Teng-hui's (李登輝) daughter, Annie Lee (李安妮), was named the TSU's representative, while former Control Yuan member and former member of the March 19 Shooting Truth Investigation Special Committee Yeh Yao-peng (葉耀鵬) is the PFP's committee member.

Upset by the fact that the steering committee is dominated by the four political parties, Chen Yuan-chi (陳源奇), the Chinese People's Party assembly delegate who chaired yesterday's meeting, asked the DPP and KMT to give smaller parties one of their seats.

The two parties refused to yield, saying that the composition of the committee was stipulated by law.