Leaving vacated Aboriginal legislative seats empty denies Aborigines’ representation, campaigners said yesterday, accusing Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers of seeking to delay reforms and advocating a wasteful by-election if a KMT Aboriginal legislator is stripped of their seat.
“If reforms are not implemented this term, we will be deprived of a legislator yet again,” said Association for Taiwan Indigenous Peoples’ Policies chairman Oto Micyang Raranges, who is of the Amis people.
Prosecutors have sought to annul the election of KMT Legislator Uliw Qaljupayare amid vote-buying allegations.
If Qaljupayare — a member of the Paiwan people who is also known by his Mandarin name, Chien Tung-ming (簡東明), is stripped of his seat, this would be the third consecutive legislative term for which the number of Aboriginal legislators has fallen below the constitutionally mandated six.
According to Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法) guidelines, by-elections for seats vacated by Aboriginal legislators can be held only if two of the three seats composing either of the nation’s two Aboriginal districts are vacated.
The Mountain Aboriginal District and Plains Aboriginal District are the only remaining national multi-member legislative districts, with the top three candidates in each district winning seats.
While Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers have argued to pass reforms to allow “substitution” down the list of candidates if legislators vacate their seats, KMT legislators have called to allow by-elections or delay the implementation of reforms until the next legislative term to avoid unfairly benefiting DPP candidate Walis Perin — a member of the Sediq people who would be awarded the seat vacated by Qaljupayare if substitution were allowed.
Raranges said that the expense of holding a special by-election was unjustifiable given that both Aboriginal districts are “presidential” in size — with any by-election requiring polling stations to be set up across the nation.
Substitution would not benefit any particular political party in the long run, he said.
“Since 1994, there have been seven legislative terms, with 14 potential ‘substitutions’ across the two districts if bribery charges were proven. Based on Central Election Commission data, out of the 14 candidates who would have been awarded vacated seats, nine were KMT candidates, three were People First Party candidates and one was an independent. Only one DPP candidate would have been potentially substituted into a seat,” he said.
The KMT and other pan-blue parties and factions have dominated the Aboriginal districts almost exclusively since they were established as part of constitutional changes in 1994.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
‘SPEY’ REACTION: Beijing said its Eastern Theater Command ‘organized troops to monitor and guard the entire process’ of a Taiwan Strait transit China sent 74 warplanes toward Taiwan between late Thursday and early yesterday, 61 of which crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait. It was not clear why so many planes were scrambled, said the Ministry of National Defense, which tabulated the flights. The aircraft were sent in two separate tranches, the ministry said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday “confirmed and welcomed” a transit by the British Royal Navy’s HMS Spey, a River-class offshore patrol vessel, through the Taiwan Strait a day earlier. The ship’s transit “once again [reaffirmed the Strait’s] status as international waters,” the foreign ministry said. “Such transits by
RSS