Army veteran Chao Yen-ching’s (趙衍慶) candidacy in Taipei’s mayoral election has sparked a debate about the deposits that candidates have to pay. The nation’s election and recall laws do indeed impose a lot of limitations on the right to vote and stand for election, thus obstructing the development of democracy.
According to Article 130 of the Constitution, any citizen who has reached the age of 20 has the right to vote in an election, and those who have reached the age of 23 have the right to be elected. Given that the Constitution provides only the most basic safeguards of citizens’ rights, if legislators were to alter election and recall laws so as to lower the voting age to 18, there would be no question of its being unconstitutional. On the other hand, Article 24, Paragraph 1 of the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選罷法) may restrict the basic safeguards provided by the Constitution by infringing upon citizens’ rights to be elected, since it sets the minimum age for candidates for township mayors at 26, and for municipal mayors and county commissioners at 30 years old.
Another, even more dubious, limitation is the requirement that candidates pay deposits. Although Judicial Yuan Interpretation No. 469 appears to recognize the constitutionality of the requirement to pay election deposits, the size of such deposits should be reviewed in view of social evolution and should comply with the principle of proportionality. Among the deposits announced by the Central Election Commission for the upcoming elections, candidates for county commissioners and city mayors have to pay NT$200,000 (US$6,450), but the amount leaps to NT$2 million for mayoral candidates in special municipalities.
The commission’s announcement offers no explanation of what standard or basis was used to calculate these deposits or why there is such an enormous difference between them. What is certain is that the deposits are an impediment to political participation by young people and those with limited assets and funding.
According to Article 32, Paragraph 4, Subparagraph 2 of the act, when the votes gained by a candidate are less than 10 percent of the result gained by dividing the total number of electors in the electoral district by the number of seats open to election, the deposit will be forfeited. This is like imposing a fine on poorly performed candidates, with the effect of strangling citizens’ right to political participation.
Furthermore, Article 43, Paragraph 1 of the same act awards a subsidy of NT$30 per vote to those who are elected. This weights the scales, which are already unbalanced, even more heavily in favor of rich and powerful people.
Democratic elections are supposed to reflect the diversity of society and be broadly representative of it. If this is to hold true, the exercise of citizens’ rights to elect and stand for election cannot be restricted by laws that legislators enact as they please, or by orders issued by executive departments at the drop of a hat.
For the same reason, the age limits that election and recall laws impose regarding the rights to elect and stand for election really need to be lowered. The size of deposits should also be lowered across the board, and it should not be up to the Central Election Commission alone to set them as it pleases.
In the long term, lawmakers should consider abolishing deposits altogether, or adopting a twin-track system under which prospective candidates have to gather citizens’ signatures as well as pay a deposit. Only if such changes are made can the Constitution’s safeguards of the right to participate in politics be truly put into practice.
Wu Ching-chin is chair of Aletheia University’s Department of Law and a standing board member of Taiwan Forever.
Translated by Julian Clegg
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