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Presidential election 2008: 19 days to go: Academics deplore Referendum Law

Rather than encourage direct democracy, in its present form the Referendum Law (公民投票法), with its high proposal and passage requirements, is blocking it, participants at a forum in Taipei said yesterday.

"The Referendum Law needs some changes," Judicial Reform Foundation executive director Lin Feng-cheng (林峰正) told the forum, which had been organized by the Constitution Reform Alliance.

Jou Yi-cheng (周奕成), convener of the Third Society Party, agreed.

"The high requirements contained in the Referendum Law mean that only the president, the legislature and major political parties can propose a referendum," Jou said.

"Instead of facilitating direct democracy, referendums have been turned into yet another arena for major parties to fight outside the legislature," he said.

"We must give back the power to make referendum petitions -- a tool of direct democracy -- to the people," he said.

According to the law, referendum proposals must be accompanied by signatures of more than 0.5 percent of the number of voters in the most recent presidential election.

After the Central Election Commission (CEC) approves a referendum proposal, the petitioner must gather the endorsement of more than 5 percent of the number of people who voted in the most recent presidential election within six months following the CEC's approval.

In current terms, this means that a proposal for a referendum must first receive 82,000 signatures and be endorsed by 820,000 people.

A referendum is passed only once more than 50 percent of eligible voters have voted on it and more that 50 percent of those who voted in the referendum supported it.

Other than collecting signatures, the president and the legislature may also make proposals.

"To better describe it, we should rather call the Referendum Law the `Referendum Blockage Law,'" Lin said.

Aside from the high thresholds, Green Party Taiwan secretary-general Pan Han-shen (潘翰聲) also criticized the "50 percent eligible voter turnout" rule.

"Since the law requires a 50 percent eligible voter turnout to pass a referendum, the opponent of a proposal can simply boycott a referendum by asking people not to take referendum ballots at polling stations," Pan said.

"Moreover, those who, for various reasons, could not make it to polling stations would become de facto opponents of a referendum proposal," he said.

"I think it would be more reasonable if the passage of a referendum depended on the number of `yes' votes received rather than how many people voted on it," Pan said.
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