|
Legislators ignore
watchdog¡¦s pledge
SLOW GOING: So far, only 30 DPP legislators and
10 KMT legislators have signed a pledge from the CCW to push for greater
transparency in the Legislative Yuan
By Shih Hsiao-kuang / Staff Reporter
An attempt by a government watchdog group to get legislators to pledge reforms
in the Legislative Yuan has yielded a poor response.
The Citizen Congress Watch (CCW) recently sent the legislature¡¦s 113 members a
letter asking them to move toward reforms that would increase transparency in
the body during the current session. As of the end of last month, only 40 had
signed up.
The CCW says that legislative meetings are not open enough and has long
petitioned for the legislature to push through amendments that would make
proceedings more transparent.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Policy Committee chief Lin Hung-chih (ªLÂE¦À) said
that during the previous legislative session, the KMT and the CCW had problems
interacting.
The KMT caucus then decided that its members should not -cooperate with the
watchdog¡¦s requests, Lin said.
Since the beginning of the seventh legislature, the KMT has listed the CCW as an
¡§unwelcome group¡¨ because the party is unhappy with how the watchdog conducts
its performance evaluations of legislators, Lin said.
However, the KMT caucus opened its doors to the watchdog in March last year in
an attempt to ameliorate the situation, Lin said.
Soon afterward, Lin said, the KMT again decided to stop cooperating with the CCW
and refused to offer any records of speeches, attendance or information on
government oversight because of a request by the watchdog to the legislature¡¦s
standing committee conveners to allow sit-ins during committee meetings.
However, some KMT legislators have continued to cooperate with the CCW and have
accepted their performance evaluations and recommendations.
Lin said that any changes to its current stance of non--cooperation would depend
on whether the situation between the KMT and the CCW improved or not, adding
that the caucus would make further decisions after a meeting on the subject.
This is why the majority of pan-blue members have withheld responses to the
CCW¡¦s letter, Lin said.
Meanwhile, KMT Deputy -Secretary-General Wu Yu-sheng (§d¨|ª@) rejected the request,
saying that the CCW was impolite toward legislators and that the group¡¦s demand
that legislators reply to the letter within a certain time period was ¡§arrogant
and crossed the line.¡¨
Wu said he strongly supported the motion not to cooperate with the organization.
In response, CCW chairman Koo Chung-hwa (ÅU©¾µØ) said the KMT¡¦s attitude did not
matter, adding that the group had served its purpose of highlighting
legislators¡¦ attitude toward the watchdog group, and voters would decide.
Koo said the CCW would visit legislators in the hopes that they would cooperate
and sign the pledge and would announce the results of its drive at a later date.
So far, 30 signatures from Democratic Progressive Party legislators and about 10
from KMT legislators have been received, Koo said.
Translated by Jake Chung, Staff writer
|
