Judicial Reform and "Black Gold"

Lung-chu Chen

Judicial reform, long promised by President Lee Teng-hui, has taken a new step this week as the National Judicial Reform Conference is in progress. Democracy and the rule of law are the two main values that protect human rights in a modern, civilized society. Taiwan's democratization has been growing strong after decades of effort by the Taiwanese people. However, there has not been much development in the rule of law due to the government's neglect of the matter.
A large part of the conference's agenda is taken up by technical issues, such as criminal law procedures. But there are many other problems that need to be addressed, especially what is known as "black gold."  Unfortunately, despite various pleas, the "black gold" issue is not likely to be considered by the conference.

The recent scuffles in the legislative chamber underscored the urgent necessity of dealing with the "black gold" issue. The fist fight occurred when the KMT, with its absolute majority in the legislature, tried to force through a law that allowed people implicated in criminal offences to nevertheless take executive positions at farmers' and fishermen's associations.
Organized criminal elements have infiltrated elected bodies at various levels island-wide and threatened administrative bodies with their supervisory and auditing powers. Furthermore they can pass various laws and regulations, such as the recent "Gambling Rider," to serve their self-interests. According to statistics, 50 of the Legislative Yuan's 225 lawmakers have criminal records and more than one third of all legislators have organized crime backgrounds.

"Go free if you get elected, get jailed if you don't" has become a common slogan during election campaigns in Taiwan. Legislators have been using the legislature's revision of the Judicial Yuan's budget, participation in the legislature's judicial affairs committee, and their supervisory power over the Ministry of Justice as tools to influence trial of legislators and dilute final judgments.

Ensure the independence of judges and prosecutors, resist interference from legislators, realize the promise of "not just killing flies, but killing tigers", and implement the ideal of equality before the law. This is what the general public expects from judicial reform.

(The author is founder and chairman of Lung-chu Chen New Century Foundation)