Nineteen legislator recall campaigns passed an initial review and are to enter the second-stage petition, while the nine cases that did not reach the threshold would have another opportunity for supplementary submissions, the Central Election Commission (CEC) announced yesterday.
The CEC said it had received 64 recall proposals — 54 for lawmakers, one for a city mayor and nine for city or county councilors.
The 19 cases that passed the threshold were all against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators, and the nine that did not reach the threshold were against Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators, people familiar with the matter said.
Photo: CNA
The 19 KMT lawmakers facing the second stage of the recall process include KMT caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅?萁), KMT caucus deputy secretary-general Wang Hung-wei (王鴻薇) and legislators Yeh Yuan-chih (葉元之), Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) and Ma Wen-chun (馬文君), sources said.
Suspended Hsinchu Mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) is also said to be among the recalls that passed the threshold.
The nine DPP lawmakers whose recall proposals failed to meet the first-stage threshold are Wu Pei-yi (吳沛憶), Su Chiao-hui (蘇巧慧), Chang Hung-lu (張宏陸), Wu Chi-ming (吳琪銘), Tsai Chi-chang (蔡其昌), Ho Hsin-chun (何欣純), Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷), Saidhai Tahovecahe and Chen Ying (陳瑩), sources said.
By law, recall proposals must be reviewed by the CEC within 25 days, meaning that those submitted on Feb. 3 must be reviewed by today.
If a proposal meets the threshold requirements, the campaign’s leading proponent collects the petition from the commission within 10 days of receiving notice, the CEC said.
The recall process has three major stages, according to the CEC Web site.
The first stage requires signatures from 1 percent of total voters in the official’s electoral district, the second is a petition that must be signed by at least 10 percent of total voters within 60 days and the third is a simple majority vote in which total turnout must be at least 25 percent of voters in the district.
DPP spokeswoman Han Ying (韓瑩) said that constituents of 10 DPP legislators said they were impersonated in recall petitions.
The DPP legislators were Wang Mei-hui (王美惠), Chen Kuan-ting, Lee Kuen-cheng (李坤城), Huang Jie (黃捷), Hsu Chih-chieh (許智傑), Wang Ting-yu (王定宇), Su, Wu Chi-ming, Lin Chun-hsien (林俊憲) and Chen Chun-yu (陳俊宇), she told a news conference.
While two constituents of Wang Mei-hui and Chen Kuan-ting filed a lawsuit against impersonators themselves, Lee, Huang, Hsu and Wang Ting-yu are seeking prosecution on their behalf, Han said.
As all the constituents impersonated had been Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) members years ago, the party accused the KMT of misusing their personal information.
Han also said the recall petition against Wang Mei-hui apparently involved illegal maneuvers, as the petitioner ceased the second phase of his petition shortly after her constituents filed a lawsuit against him.
Attorney Huang Di-ying (黃帝穎), head of an eight-member legal team aiming to help recall petitioners, said that people who have joined the KMT could receive a petition inquiry letter while not taking part in a petition, as they might have been impersonated by someone copying their name from a register.
Impersonation is punishable by up to five years in jail for forgery, up to three years for forged signature or an up-to-five-year sentence with a fine of up to NT$1 million (US$30,469) for unlawful collection and use of personal information, he said.
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
Taiwan yesterday denied Chinese allegations that its military was behind a cyberattack on a technology company in Guangzhou, after city authorities issued warrants for 20 suspects. The Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau earlier yesterday issued warrants for 20 people it identified as members of the Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM). The bureau alleged they were behind a May 20 cyberattack targeting the backend system of a self-service facility at the company. “ICEFCOM, under Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, directed the illegal attack,” the warrant says. The bureau placed a bounty of 10,000 yuan (US$1,392) on each of the 20 people named in
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
RSS