The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday retracted its motion to force a proposed amendment to the Local Government Act (地方制度法) through to a second reading following opposition protests.
DPP lawmakers had taken turns “guarding” outside the doors to the main chamber of the legislature since Tuesday and rushed in at 7am yesterday to register the amendment to the act on the list of items to discuss.
The DPP had also attempted to use its legislative majority to move the proposed amendment directly to a second reading and bypass committee review.
Photo: CNA
Legislative procedures stipulate that a draft or proposed amendment is to be sent to a committee for review. Once a committee approves it, a proposal moves to a second reading in the legislature, which precedes a third reading, at which only textual changes are made.
Enraged by the DPP lawmakers’ move, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers occupied the podium at 10:17am.
New Power Party (NPP) lawmakers criticized the DPP, saying that the proposed changes to the act were to help Hsinchu Mayor Lin Chih-chien (林智堅) sidestep term restrictions and be re-elected as the head of a new municipality if Hsinchu city and county are merged.
Lin has been Hsinchu mayor since Dec. 25, 2014, and is not permitted to seek another term.
However, should the merger take place to form Taiwan’s seventh special municipality — as the DPP has proposed — Lin would be eligible to contest its mayoralty, NPP Legislator Chiu Hsien-chih (邱顯智) said.
Legislative Speaker You Si-kun (游錫堃) shortly before noon announced a recess after the DPP said that the proposed amendment would follow regular legislative procedure.
A motion raised by the KMT, the Taiwan People’s Party and the NPP to have the DPP resubmit its proposal to the legislature’s Procedure Committee was rejected.
Instead, the proposal was sent to the Internal Administration, the Judicial and the Organic Laws and Statutes committees.
In other developments, the legislature yesterday adopted a proposal to send the central government’s budget for next year back to committees for review, having previously opted to move it directly to a second reading.
The DPP proposed that the NT$2.2391 trillion (US$80.72 billion) budget be returned to the committee review stage three days after using its majority to force it through to a second reading, bypassing committee review.
The proposal was adopted without objection by opposition lawmakers.
The decision was in line with the conclusion of interparty negotiations on Thursday, during which the DPP agreed to back down, while the KMT and others in the opposition agreed that the committees would complete their reviews of the budget by Thursday and the bill would clear the legislature no later than Jan. 28.
A decision made during interparty negotiations is binding if it is backed by all caucuses.
The DPP on Tuesday defended its decision to skip committee review, saying that the KMT deliberately held up the process.
However, the move sparked outrage among opposition figures, who said that the decision was unprecedented and accused the DPP of disregarding legislative procedure.
Additional reporting by Chang Cheng-yu and CNA
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