Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) yesterday initiated a proposal for a referendum calling for referendum voting to be held concurrently with national elections, with the aim of “returning power to the people.”
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has used its legislative majority to rule aggressively since coming to power in 2016 and prevented members of the public from expressing themselves on issues, Chiang told a news conference in Taipei.
“This situation demonstrates the importance of direct democracy,” he said.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
The outcomes of the 2018 referendum votes were not what the DPP had hoped for, so it decoupled referendums from presidential elections, changing the law so that referendum voting would only be held every two years, he said.
The DPP on June 17 last year amended the Referendum Act (公民投票法) so that referendum voting would be held every two years — but not on years when presidential elections are held — on the fourth Saturday of August.
“[The DPP] turned the ‘birdcage referendum’ into an ‘iron cage referendum.’ It has turned its back on all that it strove to achieve over more than 30 years, and has harmed people’s rights,” he said.
Referendum voting is a constitutionally protected right of Taiwanese and a way for people to directly exercise their rights, but restricting when referendum voting can occur restricts when people can exercise this right, he said.
Police reports of breaches of the Social Order Maintenance Act (社會秩序維護法) have increased over the past few years, Chiang said, citing an example of an issue that might be of public concern.
In 2018, there were 21 cases, but last year, there were 151 cases and in the first five months of this year, there were 233 cases — but only a 25 percent conviction rate, he added.
“Is Taiwan becoming a police state?” he asked.
The value of democracy is the ability to question the government and a democratic government has a responsibility to respond to the public, not bring charges against them, he said.
“Otherwise, what has changed since the White Terror era of the past?” Chiang asked.
In the face of this threat, Chiang said that he felt compelled to propose a referendum calling for referendum voting to be held alongside presidential elections.
Holding referendum voting separately costs taxpayers about NT$850 million (US$28.8 million), but when held together, as in 2018, referendum voting only cost NT$145 million, he said.
“This is not just a KMT issue — it concerns all Taiwanese nationwide,” KMT Institute of Revolutionary Practice director Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) said.
“The public must not sit idly by and watch as the DPP turns the nation into a one-party state,” Lo said, adding that the KMT would keep the DPP in check starting at the grassroots level.
If Chiang’s referendum is successful, referendum voting could be tied to by-elections as soon as 2022 and presidential elections as soon as 2024, Lo added.
The inspection equipment and data transmission system for new robotic dogs that Taipei is planning to use for sidewalk patrols were developed by a Taiwanese company, the city’s New Construction Office said today, dismissing concerns that the China-made robots could pose a security risk. The city is bringing in smart robotic dogs to help with sidewalk inspections, Taipei Deputy Mayor Lee Ssu-chuan (李四川) said on Facebook. Equipped with a panoramic surveillance system, the robots would be able to automatically flag problems and easily navigate narrow sidewalks, making inspections faster and more accurate, Lee said. By collecting more accurate data, they would help Taipei
TAKING STOCK: The USMC is rebuilding a once-abandoned airfield in Palau to support large-scale ground operations as China’s missile range grows, Naval News reported The US Marine Corps (USMC) is considering new sites for stockpiling equipment in the West Pacific to harden military supply chains and enhance mobility across the Indo-Pacific region, US-based Naval News reported on Saturday. The proposed sites in Palau — one of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies — and Australia would enable a “rapid standup of stored equipment within a year” of the program’s approval, the report said, citing documents published by the USMC last month. In Palau, the service is rebuilding a formerly abandoned World War II-era airfield and establishing ancillary structures to support large-scale ground operations “as China’s missile range and magazine
A 72-year-old man in Kaohsiung was sentenced to 40 days in jail after he was found having sex with a 67-year-old woman under a slide in a public park on Sunday afternoon. At 3pm on Sunday, a mother surnamed Liang (梁) was with her child at a neighborhood park when they found the man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and woman, surnamed Huang (黃), underneath the slide. Liang took her child away from the scene, took photographs of the two and called the police, who arrived and arrested the couple. During questioning, Tsai told police that he had met Huang that day and offered to
BETTER SERVICE QUALITY: From Nov. 10, tickets with reserved seats would only be valid for the date, train and route specified on the ticket, THSRC said Starting on Nov. 10, high-speed rail passengers with reserved seats would be required to exchange their tickets to board an earlier train. Passengers with reserved seats on a specific train are currently allowed to board earlier trains on the same day and sit in non-reserved cars, but as this is happening increasingly often, and affecting quality of travel and ticket sales, Taiwan High-Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) announced that it would be canceling the policy on Nov. 10. It is one of several new measures launched by THSRC chairman Shih Che (史哲) to improve the quality of service, it said. The company also said
RSS