The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus conducted its first-ever occupation of the legislative speaker’s podium on Friday. What is strange is not only that the KMT made the decision to block legislative proceedings by occupying the podium, a move it had always looked down upon, but also that it chose to take issue with a motion demanding the retraction of controversially adjusted curriculum guidelines.
The KMT caucus said that it opposed the processing of the motion because it was never discussed in cross-caucus negotiations as it should have been.
The KMT had a point in terms of “procedural justice,” but as Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) later said, KMT caucus whip Lin Te-fu (林德福) never came to him asking to conduct negotiations over the motion that the KMT caucus had pulled from the floor agenda.
More intriguingly, KMT lawmakers effectively obstructed legislative proceedings by protesting the non-negotiated motion being put to a floor vote only after the motion was voted on and passed. If the aim of the occupation was to block the passage of the motion, the move was certainly a botched one. However, if that was not the aim, what was?
Lin said in a news conference afterward it was a good thing that a “loophole in the procedure” has been found — meaning that a motion pulled for a cross-caucus negotiation could nevertheless be processed without having been negotiated on — and could now be fixed.
However, during the pre-vote discussion over the motion, as many as six KMT lawmakers registered to speak and were prepared — although two could not speak, as they were not present when called upon — with pre-written statements, with the contents not restricted to procedural concerns.
Calling for “tolerance” for different historical perspectives — a peculiar and brazen assertion considering the disputed procedures through which the guidelines had been drawn up and the China-centric adjustments that were forced through — and emphasizing that retraction of the new guidelines alone would not automatically make the old ones effective, the lawmakers repeated the Ministry of Education’s official stance.
The incoming DPP administration would — hopefully, if it sticks to what it has promised — not approve the curriculum guidelines. The reason DPP Legislator Cheng Li-chun (鄭麗君), the future minister of culture who proposed the motion, wants to pass the motion urging the ministry to retract the guidelines, is probably more symbolic than substantive — her mentioning of Dai Lin (林冠華), the student activist who committed suicide during anti-curriculum protests, further attested to the symbolism.
The KMT’s blockade was also symbolic, knowing that there is a high probability that the new administration would scrap the guidelines anyway. The move to defend the controversial guidelines after January’s electoral rout brings to mind KMT policy director Alex Tsai’s (蔡正元) remarks last week, in which he said he was not afraid of scaring off non-aligned voters, as it is more important to call back loyal voters. In other words, the occupation of the podium over the guidelines issue, pertaining to a contentious interpretation of history, could be a gesture aimed at arousing emotions.
Was Tsai — who said that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was unwise to try to attract pan-green voters with the belief that they were non-aligned — the mastermind behind the occupation? Even if he was not, would the KMT caucus walk in the same direction?
It remains to be seen whether the KMT can rise from its ashes with the support of its “loyal” supporters, the percentage of which could be optimistically estimated at more than 50 percent.
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