Taiwan Church News

3303 Edition

June 15 - 21, 2015

Church Ministry

TAUP Condemns KMT Betraying Taiwan Society's Consensus On Constitutional Reform

Reported by Chiu Kuo-rong

On June 12, a press conference was held by Taiwan Association of University Professors(TAUP) strongly condemning the Chinese Nationalist Party(KMT) for her shameless obstruction of the constitutional reform demanded by Taiwan society.

There were four amendment bills submitted to the Constitutional AmendmentCommittee of the Legislative Yuan. Democratic Progressive Party(DPP) and other minority parties supported the bills of lowering of the voting age (to 18) and loosening the threshold for parties to secure representations in the legislature. Yet, KMT preferred the bills of absentee voting and the legislature's power to approve the premiership.

The critical point of the whole issue is that DPP and KMT had differentopinions over the legislature method: whether these constitutional reform bills should be amended separately or as a package. DPP and minority parties suggested to put down the contentious bills, meaning KMT's bills, and let go the bills already got consensus; yet KMT insisted to bundle their preferred bills with the consensus bills together.

As June 16 was the last day of Taiwan's legislature's plenary session and thelast chance to pass in time the bill of the constitutional amendment for a referendum to take place alongside next year's presidential and legislative election, TAUP stood up to condemn KMT's betrayal of the will of Taiwan people and urged Taiwan citizens also to denounce such constitutional breach.

Prof Lin Hsiu-sin, Vice President of TAUP, pointed out critically that "[Taiwan's] constitutional reform is a serious business, i.e. building the foundation of our own country, but KMT takes it as a power game only. This means KMT refuse to recognize ourselves as a state and bluntly castigate the rights of the Taiwan people. As a matter of fact, KMT is only a parasite-like party, Taiwan need not play its host".

Translated by Peter Wolfe