The unprecedented presidential recall vote failed to achieve the required majority to pass. Although the motion came to naught, emotions within the pan-blue camp continue to run high. Some want to take a more moderate stance, while others want a no confidence vote in the Cabinet. It seems Taiwanese politics will continue to sway between these two forces for a while longer.
The public doesn't seem to have a choice, and although a minority choose to participate in the political show, the majority are silent bystanders or simply part of the stage set.
Why are the Taiwanese people so helpless? Prior to the legislative vote on the presidential recall motion, People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (
"The right to vote on whether or not to recall President Chen Shui-bian [
The reason the public is helpless is that the legislature has substantively deprived them of their right to direct popular power.
How could the Legislative Yuan have such great power over the people? Our history speaks for itself.
On Aug. 23, 2003, after Non-partisan Solidarity Union lawmakers abstained from voting, the legislature passed the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) and the PFP's version of amendments to the Additional Articles of the Constitution (
These laws are similar and share a common goal: the intentional obstruction of direct popular power.
The failure of the KMT and the PFP's recall motion was a result of stringent legal requirements formulated by themselves, but that did not stop them from blaming the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) for not cooperating and the Constitution for being flawed.
This is not the first time the pan-blue camp's attempts to block democracy have come back to bite them. Under the former KMT administration, the KMT canceled the legislature's right to approve the appointment of a new premier, to prevent DPP lawmakers from blocking a KMT-nominated premier. When the new regulation became effective in 2000 after the DPP took over power, the KMT began advocating the idea that the majority party in the legislature should form the Cabinet.
KMT Chairman Ma Ying-jeou's (馬英九) moves are equally unreasonable. He said that more than 1.7 million signatures had been collected during the signature drive demanding that Chen resign, and that in about a week, the total number of signatures would reach 2.2 million, the threshold for a popularly initiated referendum.
If public opinion was really that strongly in favor of recalling Chen, Ma should have long ago initiated a referendum to lower the threshold for referendums and presidential recalls. That is the only way the KMT and PFP legislators would be able to pass a presidential recall motion by themselves.
Regardless of the motives behind the recent recall motion, the public should study Ma and Soong's rhetoric and rationally consider the importance of direct popular power. If they don't, they may well be utterly confused by the ongoing political show.
Huang Yu-lin is chief executive officer and spokesperson of the Constitutional Reform Alliance.
Translated by Lin Ya-ti
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of
RSS