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Rational talks needed, not violence
By Ku Chung-hwa 顧忠華
Sunday, Apr 25, 2010, Page 8
On Wednesday, a scuffle broke out between Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators over a bill that would open up
local colleges and universities to Chinese students. With President and KMT
Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and DPP Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) criticizing
each other over the incident, the atmosphere has become tense ahead of the
debate on a proposed economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) today.
Seeing legislators who are charged with representing the voting public give in
to their most basic instincts and roll up their sleeves is not the rational
behavior we want to see in the halls of democracy. As a monitor of the
legislature, Citizens’ Congress Watch once again condemn sthe ruling and
opposition camps for their behavior. We are particularly disappointed with the
fact that the parties’ chairpersons fail to restrain themselves and deal with
disputes through a mature negotiation mechanism and instead resort to blaming
each other. This is not the behavior of democratic leaders.
Theoretically, the ruling and opposition parties in a democracy are not enemies,
and the legislative majority and minority are in fact interdependent. They do
not fight each other in a zero sum game as there is always room for negotiation.
It is necessary for the parties to clarify their stance to the public on issues
ranging from the ECFA, the recognition of Chinese academic credentials to more
complex future cross-strait policies. They also need to give reasons as to why
the public should support such policies. This is why the public is hoping that
the ECFA debate will help promote rational political discussion and set a new
paradigm for transparency and accountability of public policy.
However, after the clashes in the legislature, it seems mutual trust between the
two camps has plumbed new depths. In addition, the Government Information Office
(GIO) has filed a “provisional disposition” against several board directors of
Public Television Service (PTS). This shows that the “hawks” inside the
government are willing to go to war to end war.
The problem is that the DPP’s political strategy seems to be that so long as it
can highlight the unfair and unjust behavior of the KMT, they stand to lose
nothing. The DPP is therefore happy to engage in such conflicts. The biggest
losers if this vicious cycle continues to be the Taiwanese public who must
frequently endure such violent behavior on the TV news. This may lead them to
question the value of democracy. Why are our legislators behaving like
gangsters? Have they all been influenced by the Taiwanese gangster movie Monga
(艋舺), which was criticized by Minister of Education Wu Ching-chi (吳清基) for
misleading youths to believe that they can solve their problems through
violence?
During today’s debate the two chairpersons should focus on formulating more
rational negotiation mechanisms to consolidate the will of the public and
propose proactive plans to win voter support. After all, power is transient and
it is he who understands reason that will be the winner in the end.
Ku Chung-hwa is chairman of Citizens’ Congress Watch.
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