Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers yesterday demanded that the executive branch “do its bit” to resolve the dispute over a ban on imports of US beef containing ractopamine residues — the latest in a string of moves over the issue faced by President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration.
Ma on Friday night instructed the party to push for a provisional legislative session to pass an amendment to the Act Governing Food Sanitation (食品衛生管理法) which would relax the ban. This came after the legislative session ended without a vote on the bill because of an opposition boycott.
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)-led opposition staged a 120-hour boycott over the past week that blocked all proceedings and prevented the vote from being called.
However, KMT lawmakers yesterday repeated their belief — already expressed at a caucus meeting on Thursday — that the Executive Yuan should ease the import ban through an executive order.
“We already set the scene for the Executive Yuan to get the issue resolved by an executive order” at Thursday’s caucus meeting, KMT Legislator Apollo Chen (陳學聖) said. “Why is the Executive Yuan throwing the ball back into our court?”
Chen said the legislature “had already paid a hefty price” over the US beef issue, as the political confrontation had provoked criticism over chaos in the legislative body and legislative inefficiency.
“Even if we have a provisional session, the problems involved in passing an amendment will be unchanged. The executive branch has to do its bit. Unless President Ma orders lawmakers to push through a vote on the issue, I would prefer not to provoke a clash with the opposition,” he said.
KMT Legislator Lu Hsueh-chang (呂學樟) doubted the possibility of resolving the issue at a provisional session and urged the Ma government to address what Lu called the root cause of the problem: public concern about the safety of ractopamine residues in beef.
KMT Legislator Alex Tsai (蔡正元) said “an aura of passivity and inactivity” has pervaded the caucus as a result of “misguided [government] policies.”
Tsai agreed with the DPP’s description of Ma as a “lame duck” president, saying that lame-duck signs “have been surfacing.”
KMT caucus whip Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇), who had repeatedly claimed he would take a hardline stance to end the boycott and secure a vote, said he wished the issue could be resolved at a provisional session through negotiation.
“If not, the Executive Yuan should try to resolve it using its executive power,” he said.
Despite complaints, KMT Central Policy Committee Chief Executive and head of the KMT caucus Lin Hung-chih (林鴻池) has already prepared a proposal demanding a provisional legislative session this week that would be devoted solely to a vote on the controversial amendment.
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) said yesterday that he would call for negotiations between political parties to decide on a date for the session.
The DPP has said that Ma is rushing to secure a resolution of the beef issue because of the upcoming meeting of the UN Codex Alimentarius Commission on July 2. If that meeting fails once again to establish safe maximum residue levels for ractopamine, Ma would find it even more difficult to justify his plan to ease the import ban.
Wang downplayed such speculation, saying that the issue had already dragged on for far too long.
“It should have been dealt with in this [just-concluded] session. Of course we now hope to have an extra session to get the issue finalized as soon as possible,” he said.
Separately yesterday, DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) said his caucus opposed a provisional session to vote on the beef bill, adding that the DPP would fight to block the amendment if a vote on the bill is tabled to take place.
Taiwan Solidarity Union Legislator Lin Shih-chia (林世嘉) also reiterated her caucus’ stance “to block the beef bill in a bid to protest the threat to public health.”
Additional reporting by Rich Chang
ENDEAVOR MANTA: The ship is programmed to automatically return to its designated home port and would self-destruct if seized by another party The Endeavor Manta, Taiwan’s first military-specification uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) tailor-made to operate in the Taiwan Strait in a bid to bolster the nation’s asymmetric combat capabilities made its first appearance at Kaohsiung’s Singda Harbor yesterday. Taking inspiration from Ukraine’s navy, which is using USVs to force Russia’s Black Sea fleet to take shelter within its own ports, CSBC Taiwan (台灣國際造船) established a research and development unit on USVs last year, CSBC chairman Huang Cheng-hung (黃正弘) said. With the exception of the satellite guidance system and the outboard motors — which were purchased from foreign companies that were not affiliated with Chinese-funded
PERMIT REVOKED: The influencer at a news conference said the National Immigration Agency was infringing on human rights and persecuting Chinese spouses Chinese influencer “Yaya in Taiwan” (亞亞在台灣) yesterday evening voluntarily left Taiwan, despite saying yesterday morning that she had “no intention” of leaving after her residence permit was revoked over her comments on Taiwan being “unified” with China by military force. The Ministry of the Interior yesterday had said that it could forcibly deport the influencer at midnight, but was considering taking a more flexible approach and beginning procedures this morning. The influencer, whose given name is Liu Zhenya (劉振亞), departed on a 8:45pm flight from Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) to Fuzhou, China. Liu held a news conference at the airport at 7pm,
Taiwan was ranked the fourth-safest country in the world with a score of 82.9, trailing only Andorra, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in Numbeo’s Safety Index by Country report. Taiwan’s score improved by 0.1 points compared with last year’s mid-year report, which had Taiwan fourth with a score of 82.8. However, both scores were lower than in last year’s first review, when Taiwan scored 83.3, and are a long way from when Taiwan was named the second-safest country in the world in 2021, scoring 84.8. Taiwan ranked higher than Singapore in ninth with a score of 77.4 and Japan in 10th with
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —