Lord Clive of India, at his impeachment for gross peculation before the House of Commons in 1774, reminded his cross-examiners of the wealth he could have stolen compared to what he did steal. "By God sir, I feel astonished at my own moderation." So might Taiwan's National Assembly representatives -- known to us all as the "young thieves" to distinguish them from the "old thieves," their geriatric mainland elected forbears ousted in 1991 -- reply to the torrent of criticism that will be poured upon them, here and elsewhere in the next few days, over the breathtaking effrontery of their extending their own term of office by two years until 2002. After all, they could have extended it to almost any date they liked. The government is powerless under the Constitution to check them. They could have done what they liked and the only thing the government could have done about it was launch what in South America is known as an auto golpa, or self-coup. It is a measure through which an elected president overthrows his own
Constitution to dissolve an uncontrollable National Assembly -- Alberto Fujimori of Peru is the deftest practitioner of this political black art.
But the point is, what to do now? Who knows? After all, the Constitution has been amended by the body responsible for amending it. Perhaps the most we can do for now is to ask how this all came about.
The immediate impetus for the term extension is, of course, the desire of the KMT deputies to be able to fleece the nation for another two years without going to all the expense of having to buy votes in another election -- the one that was scheduled for March 2000.
The reason why they got their way, however, was because they were prepared to do a deal with the DPP deputies -- without whose support no constitutional amendment can be passed due to the need for approval among 75 percent of assemblymen. The deal was this: if the term extension was passed, then the KMT would vote for the DPP's pet proposal, that elections to the assembly be abolished and deputies appointed by political parties on the basis of their vote share in legislative elections.
The DPP deputies have until now passed off this measure as a selfless attempt to set the assembly on the road to abolition. Their logic: that deputies who spend a fortune to get elected will never vote themselves out of a job, but carefully selected appointees just might.
Since the National Assembly is the proverbial 500-pound gorilla that does what it likes, we might be thankful for small mercies. Not only did the Assembly extend the period its deputies can stick their snouts into the public trough by a mere two years but, at press time last night, it appeared that a measure to grant the Assembly the right to review its own budget -- which would amount to letting the pigs decide the size of their trough and how often it was filled -- was put on ice.
Here may be a way to rein in the Assembly. Currently its budget is passed by the legislature and the DPP has previously sought to abolish the Assembly in substance if not in name by using its power in the legislature to kill this budget. This measure has, however, always been overturned by the KMT in the past. If budget cancellation is proposed next year, we shall see how serious the KMT is about reforming the Assembly.
But finally it has to be said that the current situation owes much to none other than President Lee Teng-hui (
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