Shilin District Court Chief Judge Hung Ying-hua (洪英花) yesterday questioned President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) nomination of former grand justice Hsu Tzong-li (許宗力) as Judicial Yuan president, saying a re-assumption of the position would contravene the Constitution.
At a news conference “to warn against nepotism in the nation’s judiciary,” Hung said that while Hsu upholds that the Constitution only stipulates that candidates cannot hold the position for two consecutive terms and does not explicitly prohibit re-assumption, “according to official documents regarding the Constitution-amending process [in 1997], what the Constitution means by ‘no consecutive terms’ is precisely ‘once in a lifetime.’”
The draft amendment used the examples of Germany and Italy to support the change that called for the injunction against consecutive terms, “and both German and Italian grand justices, with terms of 12 years and nine years respectively, are not allowed to be appointed for consecutive terms, which means no reappointments,” she said.
Hung also cited then-National Assembly member Thomas Peng (彭錦鵬) as saying during the amendment process that the reasoning behind the ban of serving consecutive terms was to “rule out the possibility of grand justices harboring the desire of reappointment, which would adversely affects their work of Constitution interpretation.”
Hung also quoted then-National Assembly member Yang Min-hua (楊敏華) as saying that the impossibility of consecutive terms would “prevent [grand justices] from hoping that they could enjoy a lifetime of prestige and prosperity, so that they would interpret the Constitution according to their true consciences.”
Keelung District Court Judge Chen Chih-hsiang (陳志祥) seconded Hung’s argument, saying that the 1997 constitutional amendments clearly state that: “Each grand justice of the Judicial Yuan shall serve a term of eight years, independent of the order of appointment to office, and shall not serve consecutive terms.”
Chen said the fact that “independent of the order of appointment” means that there should be no reappointment whatsoever regardless of whether there terms are consecutive or not.
Even if re-assumption of the office is practicable, “shouldn’t the interval be at least eight years instead of Hsu’s five years?” Chen asked, adding: “If five years is okay, how about five days?”
The third issue raised by Chen was that insofar as Hsu also acknowledged that there are concerns involving constitutionality over his reappointment, “the doubt of how [Hsu] could guide judicial reforms [pledged by the president] in the capacity of Judicial Yuan president therefore arises.”
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it is fully aware of the situation following reports that the son of ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai (薄熙來) has arrived in Taiwan and is to marry a Taiwanese. Local media reported that Bo Guagua (薄瓜瓜), son of the former member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, is to marry the granddaughter of Luodong Poh-Ai Hospital founder Hsu Wen-cheng (許文政). The pair met when studying abroad and arranged to get married this year, with the wedding breakfast to be held at The One holiday resort in Hsinchu
The Taipei Zoo on Saturday said it would pursue legal action against a man who was filmed climbing over a railing to tease and feed spotted hyenas in their enclosure earlier that day. In videos uploaded to social media on Saturday, a man can be seen climbing over a protective railing and approaching a ledge above the zoo’s spotted hyena enclosure, before dropping unidentified objects down to two of the animals. The Taipei Zoo in a statement said the man’s actions were “extremely inappropriate and even illegal.” In addition to monitoring the hyenas’ health, the zoo would collect evidence provided by the public
‘SIGN OF DANGER’: Beijing has never directly named Taiwanese leaders before, so China is saying that its actions are aimed at the DPP, a foundation official said National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) yesterday accused Beijing of spreading propaganda, saying that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had singled out President William Lai (賴清德) in his meeting with US President Joe Biden when talking about those whose “true nature” seek Taiwanese independence. The Biden-Xi meeting took place on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Peru on Saturday. “If the US cares about maintaining peace across the Taiwan Strait, it is crucial that it sees clearly the true nature of Lai and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in seeking Taiwanese independence, handles the Taiwan question with extra
A decision to describe a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on Singapore’s Taiwan policy as “erroneous” was made because the city-state has its own “one China policy” and has not followed Beijing’s “one China principle,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) said yesterday. It has been a longstanding practice for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to speak on other countries’ behalf concerning Taiwan, Tien said. The latest example was a statement issued by the PRC after a meeting between Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on the sidelines of the APEC summit
RSS