Taiwan's Cabinet to take countermeasures after contentious amendments passed

Taipei, Dec. 21 (CNA) Three packages of amendments approved by Taiwan's Legislature are "difficult to implement," Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said on Saturday, noting that the Cabinet would take action to counter them.

In a statement, Cho said the law revisions pushed through by opposition parties would be "difficult to implement" and that the Cabinet would seek "remedies" under the Constitution.

With the support of the main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) and the smaller Taiwan People's Party (TPP), which together hold a majority of seats in the Legislature, the amendments passed on Friday after hours of brawls between lawmakers from the opposition and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

Cho said the Cabinet "regrets" the passage of new measures to tighten recall petition requirements, curb the Constitutional Court's ability to rule on cases, and change central government revenue allocations.

He added that those provisions did not go through comprehensive discussions in the Legislature.

The premier did not specify what the executive branch planned to do next, and a Cabinet official who declined to be named said the matter was still being discussed.

Under current laws, the Cabinet can seek to reject a law passed by the Legislature by requesting the lawmaking body reconsider it, or, once the law takes effect, bring it to the Constitutional Court for adjudication.

Earlier this year, Cho's Cabinet took similar measures after the KMT and TPP lawmakers passed a package of revisions granting the Legislature broader investigative powers, most of which were ultimately struck down by the Constitutional Court.

DPP lawmakers, who had stormed into the legislative chamber the previous night in an attempt to block Friday's meeting, argued that the new measures had not been discussed thoroughly in committee, and inter-party negotiations had failed to resolve the differences.

President Lai Ching-te (賴清德) also weighed in, noting that the measures would "deprive" citizens of their right to petition for a recall of elected officials, impose "unreasonable thresholds" for Constitutional Court rulings, and risk "endangering national security" by potentially forcing the government to cut back on defense spending.

Lai, who concurrently chairs the DPP, also made an enigmatic comment on Saturday, saying, without elaborating: "Democratic disputes should be resolved with even greater democracy."

KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), on the other hand, criticized the DPP lawmakers' break-ins and efforts to stall Friday's meeting, calling them an "attempt to paralyze the Legislature" in a social media post on Saturday.

The KMT also said the new measures would better prevent recall petitions from being "abused," avoid "biased" rulings by the Constitutional Court, and help alleviate "fiscal deficits" faced by local governments.