The National Assembly is scheduled to ratify the constitutional amendments passed by the legislature last August on Tuesday. A second round of voting will be allowed if parties feel their assembly members deviate from their party's stance.
The rules were settled by the assembly's presidium, which held its second meeting yesterday afternoon. After a five-hour discussion, the steering committee decided that the 300 members of the assembly will exercise their power to confirm the constitutional amendments on Tuesday, following a report on the amendment package delivered by Deputy Legislative Speaker Chung Jung-chi (
Parties or alliances who think the first round of voting has "major flaws" can file a motion to request a second round of voting if they manage to collect signatures from 30 assembly members.
The 11-member presidium will then discuss the proposition and a second round of voting will be ordered if the presidium endorses the petition.
The result of the second round of voting will be final.
Although Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) presidium member Annie Lee (
In order to give smaller parties the opportunity to express their stance on the constitutional amendments, however, all 12 political parties and civic leagues with seats in the assembly will be able to participate in a forum at 2pm on Monday to explain their position.
Each representative will be allowed seven minutes to explain his or her party's views on the constitutional amendments.
The number of delegates the parties can send to Monday's forum is allocated in proportion to the seats each party or alliance has in the assembly.
The Democratic Progressive Party has six representatives, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has six, the TSU three, and the People First Party three. Groups with less than five assembly seats will have only one representative.
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