Campaigners secure signed petitions to recall 2 KMT lawmakers

Taipei, April 30 (CNA) Two legislators from the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) could face a recall vote after campaigners announced on Wednesday that they have collected enough signatures to initiate a vote to remove them from office.

The two campaign groups targeting KMT lawmakers Hung Mong-kai (洪孟楷) and Yeh Yuan-chih (葉元之) from New Taipei announced that they have collected 50,592 and more than 32,000 signed petitions in their bid to vote the two lawmakers out in social media posts on Wednesday.

The group campaigning against Hung said in a Facebook post that it had achieved its "safe" target of 1.3 times the legally required threshold of 10 percent of all eligible voters in Hung's New Taipei 1st electoral district.

Meanwhile, Banqiao-based campaigners seeking to oust Yeh in New Taipei's 7th electoral district said in a Line group chat that they had collected 1.37 times the legally required number of signed petitions and plan to deliver them to the city's election commission on May 5.

In response, Hung told reporters in Taipei that he has prepared for this eventuality, urging supporters to "defend the lawmaker they trust" and voice their disagreement with their ballots in the recall vote.

Participants at the KMT's rally on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei on April 26 expressed their disapproval of the people in power for taking Taiwan on an anti-democratic path to dictatorship, said Hung, who won 158,596 votes, the highest in the 2024 Jan. 13 legislative elections across Taiwan.

Yeh, a former New Taipei City councilor, who began his first four-year-term in the Legislature on Feb. 1, 2024, told CNA that his service in the electoral district has been endorsed by village chiefs and local groups.

Yeh said he believes voters can see through and will not tolerate a recall vote he described as a showdown.

The ongoing mass recall campaigns were started by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), with legislative caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) calling in early January for mass recalls to vote out KMT lawmakers.

KMT lawmakers currently hold a narrow plurality in the 113-seat Legislature and have teamed up with Taiwan People's Party lawmakers and two independents to form an opposition majority of 62-51 seats that has repeatedly challenged the DPP government under President Lai Ching-te (賴清德).

On Jan. 21, the Legislature passed the 2025 central government budget with cuts of nearly 7 percent, leading to Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) accusing opposition parties of trying to disrupt the operations of the administration.

As of Monday, the Central Election Commission said 50 lawmakers could face a recall vote if campaigners manage to collect signed petitions from 10 percent of eligible voters in their respective electoral districts by May 2 at the earliest.

The 50 lawmakers include 34 from the KMT, 15 from the DPP and one independent affiliated with the KMT, the commission said.