May the New Legislature Desist from Being an Echo Chamber of the Executive Branch Again

 May the New Legislature Desist from Being an Echo Chamber of the Executive Branch Again

United Daily News Editorial (Taipei, Taiwan)

February 19, 2020

 Translation of an Excerpt

The Legislative Yuan will reopen on February 21^st; Premier Su Tseng-chang will make his government report, explaining the government's epidemic prevention efforts. Epidemic prevention and easing the difficulties are the top agenda of the affairs of the state; however, in governance, one should never seek recipes at random. The mechanism for interactions between the executive and legislative branches is also the core in operations of our constitutional government, especially with the opening of the new parliament, all political parties will operate tentatively; how to underscore the concerted operations of the two wings, executive and legislative, through epidemic prevention, so as to effectively allow policies to work, and easing the predicament of  industries and solving problems, should be the top agenda of the new legislature.

In the past four years, the most serious problem for the DPP has been that it has been oblivious to the constitutional role and functions of checks and balances of the Legislative Yuan (LY) to reflect vox populi, frequently reducing the LY to the "legislative bureau under the Cabinet" for the convenience of governance. The opposition parties have strongly advocated that the parliament reopen as early as possible, while the DPP, nevertheless, on the grounds of "allowing the Executive Yuan to concentrate on epidemic prevention", postponed the reopening, the subtext being considering the opposition parties as "troublemakers" and considering legislative actions as "stumbling blocks for epidemic prevention". Such thinking demonstrates that the DPP caucus’ positioning of the new parliament remains "efficiency above oversight". Nevertheless, if "cooperating with the Cabinet" is still the top goal of the new parliament, it would inevitably repeat the mistakes of legislative malfunctioning and disequilibrium of constitutional governance.

The opposition parties cannot forestall the railroading of the DPP’s superior caucus in terms of parliamentary seats, and in the current political situation, they can neither become stumbling blocks in legislative action for easing the economic difficulties. However, they should not think little of themselves and abandon their defenses at will because of this. Especially, the KMT is rebuilding its image, while for the DPP to shape a new image, it has to use professional capabilities to convince others with logic, guarding well the Legislative Yuan’s gates, allowing the public to feel that they could look forward to the new parliament, new political parties, and new political picture.

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