Lawmakers yesterday upheld legislation that tightened requirements for petitions to initiate a recall of an elected official, effectively blocking the Executive Yuan’s attempt to overturn the measures.
In a meeting on the legislative floor, lawmakers from the opposition parties, who together hold a majority in the legislature, once again endorsed the amendments to the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法) passed in December last year.
The 60-51 vote in the 113-seat legislature broke along partisan lines, with two abstentions.
Photo: CNA
The revisions, which the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) government has said would “exceedingly restrict” the public’s right to recall an elected official and “significantly increase the burden” of local electoral authorities, await the president’s signature to become law.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Wu Tsung-hsien (吳宗憲) said ahead of the revote, which was requested by the Executive Yuan, that the updated measures would ensure a “more rigorous and fairer” recall petition process.
KMT Legislator Weng Hsiao-ling (翁曉玲) said that, contrary to the government’s assertions, the tightened petition rules would facilitate the vetting of petition signatures by electoral authorities.
Yesterday’s result marked the third time that the Executive Yuan has failed to overturn legislation via a revote by lawmakers after deeming the rules to be “difficult to implement” despite having been approved by the current legislature.
The previous attempts involved legislation that raised the thresholds for Constitutional Court rulings and measures aimed at granting the legislature broader investigative powers.
The revote took place a day after President William Lai (賴清德) held talks with the heads of the five branches of government — the Executive Yuan, the Legislative Yuan, the Judicial Yuan, the Examination Yuan and the Control Yuan.
During the meeting, the heads of the government branches agreed to establish a communication platform, but it remains to be seen whether such a mechanism would be effective in resolving the disagreements between the ruling and opposition parties.
Recent tensions between the two sides have extended to judicial disputes and spilled over into the public sphere, with DPP members supporting initiatives to recall KMT lawmakers and the KMT launching similar efforts.
According to the Central Election Commission, campaigners have submitted initial recall petitions for 31 KMT lawmakers and 13 DPP lawmakers.
The amendments to the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act, adopted on Dec. 20 last year, were proposed by KMT lawmakers and backed by their counterparts from the Taiwan People’s Party.
The revisions would require individuals initiating a recall petition and those who sign up for them to provide photocopies of their ID cards when submitting their signatures.
The rules as they stand only require that ID numbers and registered addresses be submitted by signatories.
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