Presidential elections and national referendums could be “good starting points” for the implementation of an absentee voting mechanism, though it would be difficult to implement the system in the seven-in-one elections next year, Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) said yesterday.
Absentee voting would increase political participation in all elections, but the technical difficulties of implementing the system for multiple elections still need to be solved, Jiang told reporters before meeting with the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) legislative caucus yesterday.
Jiang said he supports allowing absentee voting in the national referendum on suspending the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in Gongliao District (貢寮), New Taipei City (新北市), but stressed that preparations such as drafting absentee voting regulations, staff training and voter registration would have to be made by the Ministry of the Interior and the Central Election Commission before absentee voting is used in referendums.
Jiang added that the government would make sure the plant was safe before holding the vote.
The premier said that the Executive Yuan cannot set the timetable for the referendum unilaterally because it must be approved by the legislature, but the poll is likely to be held sometime between August and the end of this year.
“We are not in a rush to hold the referendum,” Jiang said. “The vote will not be held until all the necessary measures are in place.”
Responding to a question from TSU caucus whip Lin Shih-chia (林世嘉) on the legitimacy of deciding the fate of the power plant in a national referendum rather than a local poll in New Taipei City, Jiang said that the government respected the views of those who lived close to the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, but that it was illegal to put a local referendum above a national one.
“We proposed a national referendum because nuclear safety is an issue that impacts everyone,” he said.
Jiang reiterated that he would gladly engage in dialogue with anti-nuclear power groups.
Separately yesterday, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairman Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) handling of the power plant issue — in particular its absentee voting initiative — raised suspicions that its moves are politically motivated.
“It seems to me that Jiang and the KMT are not dealing with the controversy using a complete set of policies, because the party has proposed something new every day,” Su said after the DPP’s weekly Central Standing Committee meeting, citing the government’s sudden desire to have absentee voting in the referendum and Jiang saying yesterday that the poll could be postponed until the end of the year when he had previously said otherwise.
Su said that the KMT’s attempt to have absentee voting in both referendums and presidential elections “further proved that there is political calculation behind its policies.”
The DPP chairman said his party would for now focus on the upcoming anti-nuclear energy demonstration on Saturday and that it was happy to be among those participating in the protest, which has been organized exclusively by anti-nuclear groups, not political parties.
Su has previously expressed DPP support for the implementation of domestic absentee voting in national referendums.
However, DPP Deputy Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊毅) said that the KMT first had to work on amending the Referendum Act (公民投票法), which is still under deliberation in the Legislative Yuan, rather than adding more variables to the equation.
DPP politicians, including former premier Yu Shyi-kun, said the KMT’s absentee voting initiative was a strategy for the 2016 presidential election as the mechanism would allow overseas Taiwanese to vote without returning to the country.
Yu said he supported domestic absentee voting, but opposed its implementation for overseas nationals, in particular Taiwanese nationals in China, who are most likely under Beijing’s influence and would seek to interfere in elections.
If the KMT wanted to include absentee voting, it should also amend referendum laws “instead of only amending the regulations that benefit the KMT,” Yu said.
DPP Legislator Yeh Yi-jin (葉宜津) warned that even if the mechanism was implemented domestically, military personnel, police and prisoners are likely to be influenced by the ruling party.
Jiang did not include referendums in a discussion of the absentee voting mechanism in 2010, when he served as the interior minister, DPP Legislator Chiu Yi-ying (邱議瑩) said.
“That suggests that the KMT’s initiative is politically motivated,” she added.
COMBINING FORCES: The 66th Marine Brigade would support the 202nd Military Police Command in its defense of Taipei against ‘decapitation strikes,’ a source said The Marine Corps has deployed more than 100 soldiers and officers of the 66th Marine Brigade to Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) as part of an effort to bolster defenses around the capital, a source with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. Two weeks ago, a military source said that the Ministry of National Defense ordered the Marine Corps to increase soldier deployments in the Taipei area. The 66th Marine Brigade has been tasked with protecting key areas in Taipei, with the 202nd Military Police Command also continuing to defend the capital. That came after a 2017 decision by the ministry to station
‘INVESTMENT’: Rubio and Arevalo said they discussed the value of democracy, and Rubio thanked the president for Guatemala’s strong diplomatic relationship with Taiwan Guatemalan President Bernardo Arevalo met with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Guatemala City on Wednesday where they signed a deal for Guatemala to accept migrants deported from the US, while Rubio commended Guatemala for its support for Taiwan and said the US would do all it can to facilitate greater Taiwanese investment in Guatemala. Under the migrant agreement announced by Arevalo, the deportees would be returned to their home countries at US expense. It is the second deportation deal that Rubio has reached during a Central America trip that has been focused mainly on immigration. Arevalo said his
‘SOVEREIGN AI’: As of Nov. 19 last year, Taiwan was globally ranked No. 11 for having computing power of 103 petaflops. The governments wants to achieve 1,200 by 2029 The government would intensify efforts to bolster its “Sovereign Artificial Intelligence [AI]” program by setting a goal of elevating the nation’s collective computing power in the public and private sectors to 1,200 peta floating points per second (petaflops) by 2029, the Executive Yuan said yesterday. The goal was set to fulfill President William Lai’s (賴清德) vision of turning Taiwan into an “AI island.” Sovereign AI refers to a nation’s capabilities to produce AI using its own infrastructure, data, workforce and business networks. One petaflop allows 1 trillion calculations per second. As of Nov. 19 last year, Taiwan was globally ranked No. 11 for
Israel yesterday said it has begun preparations for the departure of large numbers of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip in line with US President Donald Trump’s plan for the territory, while Egypt has launched a diplomatic blitz behind the scenes to try and head off the plan. The Trump administration has already dialed back aspects of the proposal after it was widely rejected internationally, saying the relocation of Palestinians would be temporary. US officials have provided few details about how or when the plan would be carried out. Trump yesterday said that Israel would turn Gaza over to the US after the