Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said opposition party lawmakers had “sneak attacked” the Cabinet by sending a bill passed by the legislature just before the start of the Lunar New Year holiday.
The Cabinet has made a request for reconsideration through an impromptu meeting, Cho said.
The premier made the remarks in response to questions from reporters on statements made by members of opposition parties that he should resign if the Cabinet fails to reconsider amendments to the Public Officials Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法).
Photo courtesy of the Executive Yuan
The Cabinet on Friday night said it would ask the legislature to hold a revote on legislation that would tighten requirements for petitions to initiate a recall of an elected official.
The Legislative Yuan on Dec. 20 last year passed amendments to the act requiring petition signatories to submit a copy of their national identification. Although it passed the third reading last month, the legislature only on Friday sent the bill to the president.
The Cabinet during a provisional meeting asked lawmakers to reconsider the amendments, the third time the Cabinet has requested a revote in an attempt to overturn the bills.
The Executive Yuan said that the amendments were “difficult to implement” because they raised the thresholds for recall petitions, “exceedingly restricting” the public’s right to recall an elected official and “significantly increasing the burden” of local electoral authorities.
Cho also expressed dismay at the legislature sending the proposal at 4:47pm the day before the Lunar New Year holiday begins, calling it “naked political calculation.”
The legislature should not have done this as public workers were about to clock out and preparing to return home to spend the holiday with their families, he said.
While opposition lawmakers said he should be “struck out” as premier if the Cabinet’s request for reconsideration failed again following two prior unsuccessful attempts, Cho, in a baseball reference, said that he has been pitched “three balls.”
The Democratic Progressive Party yesterday said it supported the Cabinet’s efforts to seek judicial remedies “against the legislature’s mishandling” of the bills.
Opposition lawmakers should not abuse the power granted to them as a means to create political turmoil, it added.
Separately yesterday, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Wang Hung-wei (王鴻薇) said Cho was “paranoid” in saying that the legislature “sneak attacked” the Cabinet.
Wang said that Cho blamed Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), but he should know better, as Han just returned to Taiwan from the US in the early hours of Friday.
Taiwan People’s Party Acting Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) called Cho incompetent, saying that Cho’s Cabinet could do nothing but file a request for the legislature’s reconsideration.
This is the third time that Cho’s Cabinet had filed a request for reconsideration, Huang said, urging Cho to resign as premier if the request is again rejected by the legislature.
A magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck off Yilan at 11:05pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The epicenter was located at sea, about 32.3km east of Yilan County Hall, at a depth of 72.8km, CWA data showed There were no immediate reports of damage. The intensity of the quake, which gauges the actual effect of a seismic event, measured 4 in Yilan County area on Taiwan’s seven-tier intensity scale, the data showed. It measured 4 in other parts of eastern, northern and central Taiwan as well as Tainan, and 3 in Kaohsiung and Pingtung County, and 2 in Lienchiang and Penghu counties and 1
FOREIGN INTERFERENCE: Beijing would likely intensify public opinion warfare in next year’s local elections to prevent Lai from getting re-elected, the ‘Yomiuri Shimbun’ said Internal documents from a Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) company indicated that China has been using the technology to intervene in foreign elections, including propaganda targeting Taiwan’s local elections next year and presidential elections in 2028, a Japanese newspaper reported yesterday. The Institute of National Security of Vanderbilt University obtained nearly 400 pages of documents from GoLaxy, a company with ties to the Chinese government, and found evidence that it had apparently deployed sophisticated, AI-driven propaganda campaigns in Hong Kong and Taiwan to shape public opinion, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported. GoLaxy provides insights, situation analysis and public opinion-shaping technology by conducting network surveillance
‘POLITICAL GAME’: DPP lawmakers said the motion would not meet the legislative threshold needed, and accused the KMT and the TPP of trivializing the Constitution The Legislative Yuan yesterday approved a motion to initiate impeachment proceedings against President William Lai (賴清德), saying he had undermined Taiwan’s constitutional order and democracy. The motion was approved 61-50 by lawmakers from the main opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the smaller Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), who together hold a legislative majority. Under the motion, a roll call vote for impeachment would be held on May 19 next year, after various hearings are held and Lai is given the chance to defend himself. The move came after Lai on Monday last week did not promulgate an amendment passed by the legislature that
AFTERMATH: The Taipei City Government said it received 39 minor incident reports including gas leaks, water leaks and outages, and a damaged traffic signal A magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck off Taiwan’s northeastern coast late on Saturday, producing only two major aftershocks as of yesterday noon, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The limited aftershocks contrast with last year’s major earthquake in Hualien County, as Saturday’s earthquake occurred at a greater depth in a subduction zone. Saturday’s earthquake struck at 11:05pm, with its hypocenter about 32.3km east of Yilan County Hall, at a depth of 72.8km. Shaking was felt in 17 administrative regions north of Tainan and in eastern Taiwan, reaching intensity level 4 on Taiwan’s seven-tier seismic scale, the CWA said. In Hualien, the
RSS