The NT$545 billion (US$18.3 billion) special budget bill passed by opposition parties, which includes provisions for economic relief and a NT$10,000 cash handout to citizens, follows the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) pattern of vote-buying in previous elections, but now does so using taxpayer money, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus chief executive Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) said.
The KMT and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) are driving up public debt by borrowing from taxpayers and depleting state coffers, leaving the government and society to bear the consequences of future financial shortfalls, Wu said.
The opposition is misleading the public by framing the handout as a way to “share excess state revenue to benefit all citizens,” she said.
Photo: Lai Hsiao-tung, Taipei Times
The bill, passed on Friday with support from KMT and TPP lawmakers, contravenes the Budget Act (預算法), which mandates that surplus revenues first be used to repay existing government debt and then allocated to public construction to reduce the need for borrowing, she added.
“Opposition parties are afraid to talk about where the funding for their proposed relief measures would come from because doing so would reveal that they are saddling society with additional debt,” Wu said.
The KMT is claiming that the government has more than NT$800 billion in available revenue, but in reality, the figure has dropped to NT$33.5 billion, as much of the funding has already been allocated to COVID-19 relief, public health recovery, procurement of fighter jets and weapons packages, and general government operations within the Cabinet’s NT$410 billion budget she said.
“In the past, the KMT used party funds to buy votes and secure electoral victories,” Wu said. “Now they’ve upgraded to using taxpayer money in an attempt to sway the public into voting ‘No’ in the upcoming recall votes to protect their party’s lawmakers from being removed from office.”
Meanwhile, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) criticized the DPP government, following reports that the Cabinet might decline to submit a budget item for the proposed NT$10,000 cash handout, despite the passage of the special bill by the legislature.
“Around the world, governments are distributing cash to stimulate spending and boost their economies,” Chu said. “We are doing the right thing. The DPP is going against a global trend and opposing public sentiment, so their recall campaign is bound to fail.”
“The DPP government is withholding funds from citizens and attempting to cut public holidays and other benefits,” he said.
“The KMT stands firmly with the public to return surplus tax revenue to the public, while the DPP continues to work against society’s needs,” he said.
Separately, TPP Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) criticzed the DPP as being a “malevolent bully” by refusing to implement a law that was approved by the legislature.”
“If the Cabinet refuses to submit the handout budget, how can a democratic country allow such a malevolent bully like the DPP government ignore the laws approved by lawmakers?” he said.
“We are fighting against the recall vote to defend democratic values, and we must not permit the DPP to dismantle Taiwan’s rule of law and democratic system,” he added.
“The DPP’s version of democracy is one in which they rule over the public like masters, rather than the public having a democracy,” Huang added.
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