Huang Kun-huei Wins Court Case Related to ECFA Plebiscite

Huang Kun-huei Wins Court Case Related to ECFA Plebiscite
Source: All Taipei Newspapers

June 15, 2012

The Supreme Administrative Court yesterday overturned a decision by the High Administrative Court, which rejected a Taiwan Solidarity Union's (TSU) appeal against the decision of the Central Election Commission (CEC) over TSU's plebiscite petition on the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA). The Supreme Administrative Court ruled that the High Administrative Court's ruling was not appropriate and the CEC's procedure was not in accordance with the relevant law. According to the Plebiscite Act, the case should have been reviewed in quasi-judicial hearings rather than just public hearings, as was done in this case. Therefore, the Supreme Administrative Court ordered that the plebiscite petition in question go back to square one.

On April 23, 2010, Huang Kun-huei (黃昆輝), chairman of Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU), a pro-independence opposition party, submitted a plebiscite petition to the CEC, i.e., "Do you agree that the government should conclude an ECFA with [Mainland] China?”

On June 3, 2010, the Cabinet’s Plebiscite Review Committee held a meeting to review the plebiscite petition submitted by the TSU. In the end, out of the 21 members, 12 voted “nay” on the plebiscite petition and 4 voted “yea,” so the ECFA plebiscite petition failed to pass.

Huang appealed to the Taipei High Administrative Court, but he lost the appeal. Huang then appealed to the Supreme Administrative Court, and he won the case this time. The ruling is final.

Teng Tien-yu (鄧天祐), secretary-general of the CEC, stated yesterday that the CEC would abide by the court's ruling, and Huang Kun-huei's case would be listed on the agenda of the next CEC meeting and the original decision would be vacated.  

Teng stated that if Huang Kun-huei's plebiscite petition was reviewed and passed by the CEC meeting, the next step would be a signature drive, i.e., a certain number of signatures needed to be collected within a specific time period. If the number of signatures collected met the minimum requirement, televised debates and platform presentations would follow, Teng explained.

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