On Wednesday, a scuffle broke out between Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators over a bill that would open up local colleges and universities to Chinese students. With President and KMT Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and DPP Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) criticizing each other over the incident, the atmosphere has become tense ahead of the debate on a proposed economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) today.
Seeing legislators who are charged with representing the voting public give in to their most basic instincts and roll up their sleeves is not the rational behavior we want to see in the halls of democracy. As a monitor of the legislature, Citizens’ Congress Watch once again condemn sthe ruling and opposition camps for their behavior. We are particularly disappointed with the fact that the parties’ chairpersons fail to restrain themselves and deal with disputes through a mature negotiation mechanism and instead resort to blaming each other. This is not the behavior of democratic leaders.
Theoretically, the ruling and opposition parties in a democracy are not enemies, and the legislative majority and minority are in fact interdependent. They do not fight each other in a zero sum game as there is always room for negotiation. It is necessary for the parties to clarify their stance to the public on issues ranging from the ECFA, the recognition of Chinese academic credentials to more complex future cross-strait policies. They also need to give reasons as to why the public should support such policies. This is why the public is hoping that the ECFA debate will help promote rational political discussion and set a new paradigm for transparency and accountability of public policy.
However, after the clashes in the legislature, it seems mutual trust between the two camps has plumbed new depths. In addition, the Government Information Office (GIO) has filed a “provisional disposition” against several board directors of Public Television Service (PTS). This shows that the “hawks” inside the government are willing to go to war to end war.
The problem is that the DPP’s political strategy seems to be that so long as it can highlight the unfair and unjust behavior of the KMT, they stand to lose nothing. The DPP is therefore happy to engage in such conflicts. The biggest losers if this vicious cycle continues to be the Taiwanese public who must frequently endure such violent behavior on the TV news. This may lead them to question the value of democracy. Why are our legislators behaving like gangsters? Have they all been influenced by the Taiwanese gangster movie Monga (艋舺), which was criticized by Minister of Education Wu Ching-chi (吳清基) for misleading youths to believe that they can solve their problems through violence?
During today’s debate the two chairpersons should focus on formulating more rational negotiation mechanisms to consolidate the will of the public and propose proactive plans to win voter support. After all, power is transient and it is he who understands reason that will be the winner in the end.
Ku Chung-hwa is chairman of Citizens’ Congress Watch.
TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG
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