Taiwan’s parliament boosts powers in challenge to president

Taiwan’s opposition-dominated parliament has broadened its own powers, overriding objections from the ruling Democratic Progressive party and ignoring large protests in the capital Taipei and other cities.

The legal amendments passed after a voting marathon on Tuesday set the stage for continued partisan confrontation, undermining President Lai Ching-te’s attempt to unify Taiwan against growing threats and pressure from China just a week after he took office.

The amendments to the law governing the legislature give it extensive authority to investigate government policies and projects, including powers to summon military officials and review classified documents.

They also allow lawmakers to find government officials guilty of contempt of parliament, a new criminal charge punishable with fines or prison, and to impose heavy fines on companies, civic groups or individuals who fail to satisfy demands for detailed testimony.

The opposition Kuomintang (KMT) and the smaller Taiwan People’s party say Taiwan’s political system gives the president powers that are too far reaching. But the ruling party, civic groups and academics said the changes undermined Taiwan’s democracy because they infringed on civic rights and left the legislature without proper checks and balances.

“This is a parliamentary coup,” said Wu Rwei-ren, a political scientist and historian at Academia Sinica, Taiwan’s top research institution.

Addressing thousands of demonstrators outside the parliament building on Tuesday night, Wu suggested Taiwan now faced a battle for its democracy.

“Today is not the end of the battle, it is the beginning of a much longer struggle each and everyone of you has to prepare for!” he shouted.

The protests are Taiwan’s largest demonstrations since the 2014 Sunflower Movement, in which students derailed a services trade deal with China by occupying parliament.

KMT and TPP politicians have called the DPP outcry disingenuous because its lawmakers proposed similar changes when they were in the opposition. “The reason they are opposing this now is not because it is unreasonable, but because they want their own team to win,” said KMT lawmaker Ko Chih-en.

DPP politicians and supporters accused the opposition of colluding with China’s ruling Communist party by pushing through the legislative amendments. The DPP regularly levels such claims against the KMT in an effort to exploit the opposition party’s embrace of a Chinese identity to undermine its credibility with voters.

Alexander Huang, head of the KMT’s international department, called the accusations “totally groundless” and said they underestimated the wisdom of Taiwan’s people and its international friends. “This is an internal reform of the chamber and has nothing to do with anyone outside Taiwan,” he said.

Some DPP members said they felt uneasy about their party’s battle rhetoric. “In fact, the powers in our constitution are unbalanced, and we should be having a debate about improving that balance,” said one DPP politician who declined to be named because he did not want to undermine his party’s position.

“The problem with what’s happened here is not the substance of the reform but the procedure,” he said. The opposition moved the amendments for voting with minimal debate, and introduced additional ones without time for discussion, according to parliamentary records.

China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and threatens to annex it if Taipei resists unification indefinitely. Beijing conducted two days of military exercises around Taiwan last week, which it called a “punishment” for Lai, a staunch defender of his country’s independence.

Tens of thousands had already demonstrated last week when the KMT and TPP started voting on the amendments, delayed only by procedural manoeuvres from the DPP. The crowd, which thinned on Tuesday morning amid torrential rains, swelled again in the evening.

Weng E-mi, a 39-year-old accountant who brought her two children to the rally, broke down when news of the final vote spread on Tuesday night. “We fought so hard for our democracy, and now we have to fight all over again!” she said, adding that members of her family had suffered persecution during the KMT’s decades-long rule by martial law, which was lifted only in 1987.

Lai has not commented on the substance of the changes, but backed his party’s call for protests, saying the opposition should “respect procedural justice”.