Arms bill may proceed next year: Wang

Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) yesterday said the period following the year-end elections would be a good time to tackle the stymied arms procurement plan, if it fails to make any progress by next month.

"While the special arms procurement bill has not yet passed the Procedure Committee, discussions now can focus only on the Patriot missile batteries, whose budget is earmarked as a regular annual budget," Wang said. "The government owes the public an explanation regarding the relationship between the missile batteries and the national referendum held in tandem with last year's presidential election."

In the country's first nationwide referendum, voters were asked to vote "yes" or "no" on whether they agree that the government should purchase more advanced anti-missile weapons to boost self-defense capabilities.

Although the vast majority of the respondents said "yes," the referendum failed to achieve the 50 percent threshold required to make it valid.

The pan-blue alliance of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and People First Party (PFP), however, say the invalid referendum represented the public's "veto" of the purchase of Patriot missiles.

The original NT$480 billion (US$15 billion) special arms procurement bill sought to purchase three PAC-3 Patriot anti-missile batteries, 12 P-3C maritime-patrol aircraft and eight diesel-electric submarines from the US.

At the request of opposition parties, the Executive Yuan has removed the NT$133 billion Patriot batteries from the proposal, and included them in the Ministry of National Defense's (MND) annual budget instead, lowering the total amount of the special budget from NT$480 billion to around NT$350 million.

Despite the government's concession, the pan-blue alliance remains opposed to the watered-down version.

After Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) took over the helm of the KMT in July, speculation has mounted that the KMT caucus was planning to push the long-stalled arms bill through to the National Defense Committee for review.

There was renewed speculation that the KMT might change its stance yesterday, but the KMT caucus dismissed such talk, saying that any change of the caucus' stance on the matter must be approved at a caucus meeting.

Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus whip William Lai (賴清德) yesterday called on the KMT caucus to push through the arms bill during today's Procedure Committee meeting if it is sincere in what it says.

"This is not the first time we have heard such speculation and we are willing to take it seriously and rationally," Lai said.

"We hope the KMT will not base its decision on the pressure of the year-end elections, because it is highly likely they will go back on their promise when the elections are over," he said.

PFP Legislator Sun Ta-chien (孫大千) yesterday reiterated his caucus' opposition to the arms procurement plan.

He also threatened to push through a party asset bill to the committee for review if the KMT dared to pass the arms procurement bill at the Procedure Committee.

"We are very sorry to hear that the KMT is planning to support the arms procurement bill," he said. "If that is the case, it is tantamount to betraying your friend and supporter, or deserting to the enemy camp in the middle of a battle."

Meanwhile, Wang yesterday endorsed a DPP lawmaker's proposal that the heads of the legislative and executive branches conduct cross-party political negotiations to discuss controversial bills in a bid to resolve the long-running political stalemate.

Although the request has not yet been formally filed, Wang said the proposal sounds feasible because Premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) could make an immediate response on behalf of the governing party.