The KMT's National Policy Foundation yesterday unveiled its draft of a proposed referendum law.
The draft, which excludes issues regarding Taiwan's sovereignty, aims to give the public a more direct role in legislation.
According to the foundation's proposal, the public, the Cabin-et, the legislature and the president will all be allowed to initiate a referendum to veto legislative bills that are highly controversial.
According to the draft, 50 percent of the legislative body can propose a referendum and a majority vote will put the proposal into action. The draft would give the legislature the power to refute any major national policy or bill that has been passed.
The Cabinet can also initiate a referendum to decide a bill's fate, according to the draft.
"If the Cabinet finds legislative bills difficult to carry out, it can reach a resolution at its Cabinet meeting to propose holding a referendum within 10 days after such bills are passed," Hwang Gin-tarng (
In order to keep the Cabinet from frequently holding referendums to spite the legislature, Hwang said that a Cabinet reshuffle would be triggered if the result of a Cabinet-initiated referendum were to go against the Cabinet.
Yesterday's draft also provides that a referendum can be initiated by the public as long as 200,000 endorsements are submitted.
A vote would then be cast during the next election or six months to a year after the referendum is announced.
However, some felt that the bar should be raised even higher.
"Two hundred thousand endorsements are too few. The threshold for endorsements should be raised higher so that no citizen can so easily call for a referendum," former member of the National Assembly, Chu Chao-hsiang (
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