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Cabinet mulls consultation on NCC nominees

The Cabinet might consult with the Legislative Yuan on the possible National Communications Commission (NCC) candidates before sending its final list of nominees to the legislature for confirmation, Cabinet Secretary-General Chen Chin-jun (陳景峻) said yesterday.

The commission's incumbent members will resign on Jan. 31 and filling the positions in the broadcasting regulator will be the first test of whether the newly elected legislature is any more willing to find common ground with the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration than its predecessor.

The newly revised NCC Organic Law (國家通訊傳播組織法) stipulates that NCC commissioners must be nominated by the premier and then confirmed by the legislature, Chen said after a meeting of the DPP's legislative caucus attended by its newly elected legislators.

When the new legislative session starts on Feb. 1, the Cabinet needs to refer to legislators a list of candidates for the NCC with the requisite professional knowledge for approval, Chen said.

Previous attempts by the administration to get nominees for government bodies approved by a KMT-controlled legislature have met with resistance.

The Control Yuan, the government's anti-corruption watchdog, has been without members and virtually paralyzed since Jan. 31, 2005, because of an impasse between President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and the lawmaking body of the list of nominees.

The need for new NCC members is the result a legislative amendment to Article 4 of the NCC Organic Law passed last month that changed how the regulatory body's members are chosen.

The original provision stipulated that the NCC should be composed of 13 members recommended by major political parties in proportion to the number of seats they hold in the legislature.

That was ruled unconstitutional in July 2006 and the verdict required that the body's organic law be amended by the end of last year.

Under the amended law, the number of NCC commissioners was cut from 13 to seven, with their term of office extended from three to four years. The premier was given full power to decide the nomination list, but the appointments are subject to confirmation by the legislature.

NCC Chairman Su Yeong-chin (蘇永欽) said yesterday that all the commissioners will definitely resign their positions, as they stated in 2006, adding that they will try to make the transition as "seamless" as possible.

Su said he wanted the commissioners to resign their positions as a team.

"The commission rules on each individual case by a consensus reached among commissioners and each commissioner has different expertise," he said. "The commission would be most effective if all the commissioners could stay and work together. And I can only ask them to stay until the day when they definitely must leave."

ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY SHELLEY SHAN
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