Officials and academics yesterday offered clashing visions for a long-delayed bill to facilitate redrawing Taiwan’s administrative regions, indicating that there is trouble ahead for the government in the latest attempt.
The Ministry of the Interior since 1992 has tried six times to advance legislation to rearrange the nation’s administrative map, Minister of the Interior Dong Jian-hong (董建宏) told a public hearing by the legislature’s Internal Administration Committee in Taipei.
The attempts failed, as lawmakers and the public alike could not agree on the legal mechanism’s design or the changes the process would have created, Dong said.
Photo: CNA
Moving administrative boundaries would entail changes to electoral districts, and local government structures and budgets, as well as other resources, with each a potential point of contention, he said.
The ministry’s latest draft bill is entitled the “act governing the division of administrative regions” to avoid the impression that the legislation would directly lead to major alterations to the administrative map, he said.
The ministry needs to pass the bill because the Local Government Act (地方制度法) governs the creation of special municipalities, but provides no provisions to adjust or establish other types of administrative regions, he said.
The bill being prepared is not for the special municipalities, he added.
The draft bill does not allow referendums to be held over the redrawing of the administrative map, for such alterations would have been planned with public input through other means, he added.
Soochow University professor of law Hu Po-yen (胡博硯) objected to the government’s proposal, saying that changing the administrative map would always be a political problem, not a legislative one.
Any law that enables the redrawing of the administrative map would have an enormous effect on residents and depriving them of a vote on the matter would spark discontent, Hu said.
Although not universally used by other nations when changing administrative division procedures, referendums should be considered a possible solution to avoid public discontent, he said.
Tunghai University professor of political science Chi Chun-chen (紀俊臣) said that drawing administrative divisions is an essential aspect of local governments and the ministry is mistaken in writing a new law instead of amending the Local Government Act.
The ministry has never been the appropriate agency to propose a change of such magnitude, said Yao Meng-chang (姚孟昌), an associate professor of law at Fu Jen Catholic University.
The nation’s ruling party has changed three times since the ministry first tried to push such a bill through the legislature, proving that the agency does not have the standing to bring about such a massive change, Yao said.
Enabling changes to administrative boundaries would interfere with the political machine that political parties depend on to win elections, Taiwan University professor of law Lin Ming-chiang (林明鏘) said.
“The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) did not dare to touch [the bill], and I don’t believe the Democratic Progressive Party would be any different,” Lin said.
Separately, the ministry said it plans to ask the Constitutional Court to dissolve the Rehabilitation Alliance Party after a court found party leader Chu Hung-yi (屈宏義) guilty of spying for China.
The High Court on June 27 sentenced Chu to 10 years in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法). The verdict can be appealed.
Chu was found guilty of accepting funds for political use from a hostile foreign power and recruiting former military personnel to betray secrets, the ministry said, citing the verdict.
As the party’s leader, Chu’s crimes threatened national security and the democratic constitutional order, which are the legal criteria for the nation’s highest court to dissolve a political party, it said.
Officials are completing the ministry’s internal procedures to file the motion to the Constitutional Court, it said.
The party must elect a new head within three months or face a fine of NT$200,000 to NT$1 million (US$6,892 to US$34,460), the ministry said, citing the Political Parties Act (政黨法), which stipulates that people sentenced to 10 years or more in prison are disqualified from leading a party.
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