Parties divided over redistricting

After the National Assembly ratified the constitutional amendments passed by the legislature last August, a new round of political disputes has begun, especially in the redistricting of constituencies, political observers said yesterday.

"Because of the reduction of the total number of legislative seats, lawmakers from both the bigger and smaller parties are afraid that they might be the next one who will be out of their job," said Swei Duh-ching (隋杜卿), a political scientist at National Chengchi University. "This fear will inevitably worsen the already fragile and volatile atmosphere in the legislature and one of the immediate disputes is surrounding the redrawing of constituencies."

As the constitutional amendments adopt a "single-member district, two-vote" system for legislative elections, the number of constituencies will be increased from the current 29 to 73. The number of legislators will also be halved from 225 to 113, starting in 2008.

As the boundaries of the new constituencies are required by law to be made available to the public one year before the election, political disputes are expected before the dust settles in 2007.

Current procedure

Under the current legislative electoral system -- or parallel system -- voters elect representatives through two different systems: a list proportional representation (PR) system and a plurality/majority system.

Under list PR system, each party or grouping presents a list of candidates for a multi-member electoral district. Voters select their preferred party, and the parties then receive seats in proportion to their overall share of the vote. The winning candidates are taken from the lists in the order of their position on the lists.

The new "single-member district, two-vote" electoral system, allows the electorate to cast one vote for a candidate and another for a party.

Since the redrawing of constituencies will have a direct and dramatic impact on the next legislative election, political parties have been bickering over who is better suited for the job.

Right for the job?

The Central Election Commission (CEC), the body currently in charge of drawing constituencies, is planning to revamp the Election and Recall Law of Civil Servants (公務人員選舉罷免法) and send the draft amendment to the Executive Yuan for approval by next month. The draft will then proceed to the Legislative Yuan for further review and final approval.

The law stipulates that the CEC is responsible for delineating constituencies for elections for the National Assembly, the Legislative Yuan, the Taiwan Provincial Consultative Council and municipal councilors.

The biggest party in the legislature, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), contends that redistricting for the new legislative electoral system should be conducted by an independent, fair organization, and that the Legislative Yuan should not be involved to ensure impartiality. The party has said the independent body can be the CEC or a newly established entity.

Legislature

Arguing that there is a danger of gerrymandering if the CEC takes on the redrawing of constituencies, the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) said that objectivity and impartiality can only be guaranteed if redistricting is handled by the legislature. The party contends that a redistricting plan that meets the public interest could be mapped out via cross-party negotiations.

The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is trying to take advantage of the pan-blue alliance's numerical edge in the legislature to push for passage of the organic law of the CEC, in which a redistricting committee would be established under the organization to guarantee "objectivity, fairness and impartiality."

The KMT, however, remained evasive about which body should be entrusted with the mission to redraw the new constituencies, or whether the redistricting should be approved by the lawmaking body, saying that everything is negotiable.

The KMT's ally, the People First Party (PFP), said that the matter should be tackled by the legislature and a redistricting committee should be established.

Despite various arguments put forward by each party, Swei said that he cannot think of any institution in the country that would be suited for the task because different people doing the job will produce a different result.

"When the rules of the game are not accepted by the players, it is very hard to continue the game," he said. "There is no such thing as a perfect electoral system in this world, but there is always an electoral system that is better than the others."

Analyzing new electoral system, Swei said that he sees it as disadvantageous to smaller parties, independents and Aboriginal lawmakers.

Candidates be forced to step on their colleagues to be nominated by their own party, and those standing a better chance of winning a party's nomination are likely to have stronger political ideology and radical opinions.

"The electorate, therefore, is left with not much choice but to chose between rascal A of the A party and rascal B of the B party," he said. "The same rule may well be applied to the candidates for at-large lawmakers."

Small parties

Liao Fu-te (廖福特), an assistant research fellow at the Institute of Law Preparatory Office at Academia Sinica, agreed with Swei that the redrawing of constituencies will be one of the hottest debates this year.

He, however, is more optimistic about the future of smaller parties.

"When the size of the constituencies becomes smaller, potential candidates must focus more on regional issues and court regional voters," he said. "Although it is not a bad thing, it is bound to make candidates lose their international perspective."