The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday said that a controversial proposal to increase the documents required by petitioners during recalls of elected representatives is intended to “reduce possible abuses in the process.”
During Friday’s legislative floor meeting, the KMT caucus placed the draft act to raise the recall threshold on Tuesday’s discussion agenda, which means that it could get a green light in passing the second reading if it is put to a floor vote.
The party’s move has raised doubts, as it comes during a public campaign for recalling legislators that was launched after the cross-strait service trade act row. Many of the officials under fire are KMT members.
Opposition parties called the KMT-proposed amendment, which would require petitioners to provide photocopies of identity cards and affidavits — in addition to the existing requirements for name, address and national identification number — “a reaction to the ‘appendectomy project,’” using a term associated with the recall campaign targeting KMT lawmakers.
KMT Culture and Communication Committee head Fan Chiang Tai-chi (范姜泰基) rebuked the allegation in a statement yesterday, saying the proposed amendment to the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法) is intended to make its content “more rigorous, complete and in accordance with the spirit of democracy and rule of law.”
“When the draft act is passed, it applies to both the ruling and the opposition parties,” Fan Chiang said. “And the recall and election processes could prevent shady abuses from happening in the future.”
The party center is united in support for the amendment, he added.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
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