People Masters, a civic group advocating amendments to the Referendum Act (公民投票法), yesterday launched a campaign urging legislative candidates to promise to push for revisions to the law if elected.
Wearing traditional hats made of bamboo leaves and T-shirts with the words “People are Masters,” about 100 volunteers from the organization gathered at Liberty Square in Taipei to go through a brief training session before departing for a march around the city to hand out fliers.
“Although we passed the Referendum Act in 2003, it’s actually a law that blocks citizens from practicing their right to referendums,” People Masters executive committee member Cheng Li-chun (鄭麗君) said.
Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Taipei Times
Because of the high threshold needed to endorse a referendum proposal and because a proposal must be reviewed by the Referendum Review Committee, “the Referendum Act … has become an obstacle to direct democracy,” she said.
In the four years since President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) took office, the government has blocked all referendum proposals on nationwide issues, Cheng said.
“The Chinese Nationalist Party [KMT], which has an absolute majority [in the legislature] and Ma should be held responsible for not having done anything in the past four years to revise the law,” Cheng said, adding that the goal of their campaign was to tell legislative candidates “what the people want.”
Besides asking candidates to promise to push for amendments, they also handed out postcards to voters so they could deliver the message to candidates in their electoral districts that they want a revision to the act.
The group is also calling for the referendum proposal threshold to be lowered, that the Referendum Review Committee be abolished and that the clause in the law that requires an absolute majority for a referendum proposal to pass be deleted.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislative candidate Lo Chih-cheng (羅致政), who is running for the seventh electoral district, which covers part of New Taipei City’s (新北市) Banciao District (板橋), and Pasuya Yao (姚文智), who is running in Taipei’s Shihlin (士林) and Datong (大同) districts, as well as Cheng herself, who is on the DPP’s at-large list, have promised to push for amending the law if elected.
Two other DPP candidates, Chien Yu-yen (簡余晏) for Taipei’s Zhongshan (中山) and Songshan (松山) districts and Yen Sheng-kuan (顏聖冠) for Taipei’s Zhongzheng (中正) and Wanhua (萬華) districts, have also promised to do so.
SHIPS, TRAINS AND AUTOMOBILES: The ministry has announced changes to varied transportation industries taking effect soon, with a number of effects for passengers Beginning next month, the post office is canceling signature upon delivery and written inquiry services for international registered small packets in accordance with the new policy of the Universal Postal Union, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications said yesterday. The new policy does not apply to packets that are to be delivered to China, the ministry said. Senders of international registered small packets would receive a NT$10 rebate on postage if the packets are sent from Jan. 1 to March 31, it added. The ministry said that three other policies are also scheduled to take effect next month. International cruise ship operators
HORROR STORIES: One victim recounted not realizing they had been stabbed and seeing people bleeding, while another recalled breaking down in tears after fleeing A man on Friday died after he tried to fight the knife-wielding suspect who went on a stabbing spree near two of Taipei’s busiest metro stations, Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) said. The 57-year-old man, identified by his family name, Yu (余), encountered the suspect at Exit M7 of Taipei Main Station and immediately tried to stop him, but was fatally wounded and later died, Chiang said, calling the incident “heartbreaking.” Yu’s family would receive at least NT$5 million (US$158,584) in compensation through the Taipei Rapid Transit Corp’s (TRTC) insurance coverage, he said after convening an emergency security response meeting yesterday morning. National
PLANNED: The suspect visited the crime scene before the killings, seeking information on how to access the roof, and had extensively researched a 2014 stabbing incident The suspect in a stabbing attack that killed three people and injured 11 in Taipei on Friday had planned the assault and set fires at other locations earlier in the day, law enforcement officials said yesterday. National Police Agency (NPA) Director-General Chang Jung-hsin (張榮興) said the suspect, a 27-year-old man named Chang Wen (張文), began the attacks at 3:40pm, first setting off smoke bombs on a road, damaging cars and motorbikes. Earlier, Chang Wen set fire to a rental room where he was staying on Gongyuan Road in Zhongzheng District (中正), Chang Jung-hsin said. The suspect later threw smoke grenades near two exits
The Forestry and Nature Conservation Agency yesterday launched a gift box to market honey “certified by a Formosan black bear” in appreciation of a beekeeper’s amicable interaction with a honey-thieving bear. Beekeeper Chih Ming-chen (池明鎮) in January inspected his bee farm in Hualien County’s Jhuosi Township (卓溪) and found that more than 20 beehives had been destroyed and many hives were eaten, with bear droppings and paw prints near the destroyed hives, the agency said. Chih returned to the farm to move the remaining beehives away that evening when he encountered a Formosan black bear only 20m away, the agency said. The bear
RSS