The visit by Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) will be a milestone. It will likely lead to agreements between ARATS and Taiwan’s Straits Exchange Foundation on cross-strait cargo, flight routes and the establishment of a food safety mechanism.
The question is how such agreements should be legally defined, to what extent they are binding on the government and the public and how the legislature should approach supervision of the agreements. All are issues that must be carefully considered before any deals are reached.
As expected, Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng’s (王金平) suggestion that any agreements be submitted for legislative review was opposed by the Cabinet and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) headquarters. The KMT is in charge of the executive and the legislature and does not want interference from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislative caucus or any other legislators who sense an opportunity in holding any deal to account.
The KMT seems to think that blocking legislative review of cross-strait agreements will keep the DPP, and the legislature more generally, from meddling. However, Article 5 of the Statute Governing Relations Between Peoples Of The Taiwan Area And The Mainland Area — a pan-blue-camp amendment — states that contents of agreements requiring legislative amendment must be submitted to the legislature within 30 days of the agreement being settled, and even when no amendments are required, the contents must be sent to the legislature for the record.
An act governing cross-strait agreements, which Wang seems to support, is in effect an extension of regulations from 2000 that govern the operations of a legislative group that comments on cross-strait matters. The legislative speaker and deputy speaker serve as chairmen of the group.
In 2005, pan-blue-camp legislators unanimously amended the regulations (DPP legislators had marched out in protest) to remove the Cabinet monopoly on cross-strait policy. This was done to combat DPP government policy, but now, of course, it places restrictions on a KMT government.
Governments may change, but the basics of democratic supervision should not. Cross-strait agreements are likely to have a much greater impact on Taiwan than many other bilateral deals. The legislature is charged with supervising the executive, which is why it is natural, reasonable and legitimate for such agreements to be submitted to the legislature.
Popularly elected institutions should participate in cross-strait affairs, but the different duties and powers of the executive and the legislature mean that legislators should not be involved in the execution of policy nor participate in negotiations, as this would blur the separation of powers.
Even so, the role of the legislature is worthy of further discussion. The pan-blue camp once determined that elected representatives should supervise and participate in cross-strait negotiations, so it cannot coherently attempt to block the legislature and the DPP from enjoying the same privileges.
It may be difficult, if not impossible, in the short term to develop cross-strait policies that are acceptable to the Cabinet and the legislature and to the KMT and the DPP, but in the long run, this is the only feasible solution if Taiwan is to turn a geopolitical dilemma into an opportunity.
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