President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) pledged yesterday that the second phase of constitutional reforms will be carried out according to the "deliberative democracy" concept of facilitating extensive citizen participation in the process.
Chen was speaking to a foreign delegation visiting Taiwan for an international conference on constitutional re-engineering, which has been organized by a Presidential Office panel promoting constitutional reforms.
Chen said the country achieved the first phase of its constitutional reforms on June 7, by abolishing the National Assembly to allow for public referendums on future constitutional amendments, which will give the people the final say in any proposed amendments.
According to Chen, Taiwan may appear to have practiced constitutional democracy for more than 50 years, but in reality, the system has only been in practice for around 20 years, because of the 38-year martial law period which followed soon after the Republic of China Constitution was promulgated in 1947.
Although seven rounds of constitutional reforms have been launched over the past 14 years, people are still not satisfied with the results, he claimed.
Chen noted that most of the earlier reforms were motivated by politics and not open to public participation.
As a result of such changes, the constitutional system in Taiwan appears extremely "outlandish," Chen claimed. He noted that the system is neither a presidential system, semi-presidential system nor a parliamentary system, a situation that he said has led to the current political instability in the country.
Therefore, he stressed, the second phase reform is necessary in order to maintain national competitiveness, and the concept of deliberative democracy should be employed in the next round of reform to realize "true democracy."
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
Ferry operators are planning to provide a total of 1,429 journeys between Taiwan proper and its offshore islands to meet increased travel demand during the upcoming Lunar New Year holiday, the Maritime and Port Bureau said yesterday. The available number of ferry journeys on eight routes from Saturday next week to Feb. 2 is expected to meet a maximum transport capacity of 289,414 passengers, the bureau said in a news release. Meanwhile, a total of 396 journeys on the "small three links," which are direct ferries connecting Taiwan's Kinmen and Lienchiang counties with China's Fujian Province, are also being planned to accommodate
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
RSS