Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅崐萁) organized a meeting at the Dahua Activity Center in Hualien County’s Guangfu Township (光復) to discuss post-disaster reconstruction efforts following the flood caused by the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪).
The meeting — which should have been transparent and open to the public — was kept a secret, and only those friendly to Fu were informed that it was taking place.
Meanwhile, hundreds of Guangfu residents — the actual victims of the disaster — were locked outside.
Closed door meetings are meant for discussions that include secret or confidential topics that are unsuitable for public disclosure. They are meetings limited to discussion among specific authorized people.
Is a meeting on post-disaster reconstruction efforts confidential? Why limit attendance to county government personnel, local representatives, village chiefs and a few disaster victims?
Following the flood, Guangfu was left covered in a thick layer of black mud. People from across the nation, civilians and officials, contributed time and resources to assist in cleanup efforts.
Why, then, were disaster victims and volunteers not invited to the meeting? Could it be that the meeting was fake? Was it merely an attempt to put on a political show?
In December last year, when opposition legislators led a preliminary review of amendments to the Public Officials Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法) that raised the threshold for a recall, KMT legislators held the meeting in secret and blocked the doors to physically prevent Democratic Progressive Party legislators from entering the room.
The meeting was originally meant to be attended by all legislators and journalists, who were abruptly locked outside. Looking back, that incident is very similar to Fu’s closed-door meeting.
In a shocking gesture, independent Hualien County Council Speaker Chang Chun (張峻) burst into the hall and kicked the table where Fu was sitting.
The KMT has long drifted away from the days of openness and transparency — closed-door meetings have already become the norm.
Yeh Yu-cheng is a civil servant.
Translated by Kyra Gustavsen
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