Print

Mail

wiki links

Pan-blue legislators return judicial bill to committee

Chen Chin-jun, center, a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) whip, and other DPP legislators protest yesterday after Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators sent revisions to a judicial reform bill back to committee for review. PHOTO: WANG YI-SUNG, TAIPEI TIMES

The pan-blue and pan-green camps yesterday locked horns at a legislative committee meeting, with the pan-blue alliance using its numerical advantage to send legal revisions to a judicial reform bill back to the committee for review.

Claiming that the public is still divided over the issue, pan-blue members of the legislature's Organic Laws and Statutes Committee yesterday proposed to reconsider draft amendments to the Organic Law of the Judicial Yuan (司法院組織法).

The committee on Dec. 15 gave its preliminary approval to the amendments and resolved that they did not require any cross-party negotiations before proceeding to a plenary session for second and third readings.

Under the amendments, a constitutional court would be established under the Judicial Yuan. The new court's members could be composed of members of the Council of Grand Justices who are over the age of 40, lawmakers, law professors with more than 20 years of teaching experience or those who have been involved in constitutional affairs for more than nine years.

The amendments also agreed to put Supreme Court, Supreme Administrative Court and the Commission on the Disciplinary Sanctions of Public Functionaries under the supervision of the Judicial Yuan.

In addition, the committee agreed to let the Judicial Yuan set up a civil court, penal court, administrative court and a disciplinary court.

Declaring that the Dec. 15 resolution violated Articles 58 and 59 of the Law Governing Legislators' Exercise of Power (立法院職權行使法), the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislative caucus proposed that the revisions be re-examined.

Article 58 of the legislation stipulates that legislative committees should provide committee members with a complete report of public hearings held to discuss bills within 10 days of the event being held.

Article 59 states that the report is for the reference of committee members when they are enacting or amending a law.

KMT caucus whip Pan Wei-kang (潘維剛) said that the committee held a public hearing on Dec. 14 to discuss the draft amendments but gave the approval the following day while her caucus members were absent, as they were in a caucus meeting.

Ignoring the protests lodged by pan-green committee members, Liu Shen-liang (劉盛良) of the KMT, who chaired yesterday's committee meeting, ruled that the KMT caucus had the right to file the motion asking the committee to reconsider the amendments.

With the pan-green committee members refusing to vote in a bid to express their discontent, the pan-blue dominated committee voted in favor of the KMT's proposal.

DPP Legislator Lin Cho-shui (林濁水) described opponents to judicial reforms as "audacious" and said that legislative committees have become a political battlefield and partisan pawn.

The DPP caucus yesterday also called on KMT Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to explain to the public why his party was obstructing judicial reform.

Pan, however, said that although her caucus supports judicial reform, it is adverse to handling the matter crudely and irresponsibly, as judicial experts are still divided over the issue.
This story has been viewed 1536 times.