Smart Eggs, the Problem Isn't Ballot Exposure

In the nine-in-one elections, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) emerged victorious, but it did not necessarily win everything. Taking New Taipei City and Tainan City as examples, pan-Green councilors held a majority, yet both cities ultimately lost the speakership. Rumors of vote-buying were rampant, with even the commanding legislators crying out, 'With NT$ 20 million right in front of you, what do you expect me to do?' Raising the high banner of justice, the DPP demanded that councilors engage in 'technical ballot exposure.' The righteous reason given was for the sake of democracy—to accept oversight and eliminate vote-switching or vote-buying. They further demanded that prosecutors crack down heavily on vote-buying. Compared to its previous ruthless criticisms of the Kuomintang (KMT) for doing the exact same thing, the DPP's stance inevitably carried underlying partisan self-interest.

Interestingly, the KMT also hoisted the banner of justice, striking back that the DPP's ballot exposure violated democracy and the law, and demanding that prosecutorial and investigative agencies investigate illegalities. Both parties raised similar values and manipulated the same language, merely with their roles reversed, giving one a sense of time-space disorientation. Coupled with prosecutorial agencies beating the drums on the sidelines, how is this ballot exposure supposed to end?

Open or Secret Balloting is the Crux

After the incident occurred, many commentators clearly pointed out that ballot exposure is merely a distorted practice; the real crux is whether voting should be open or secret, and accountable to the public. According to parliamentary principles, personnel-related motions should adopt secret ballot voting as a principle. The purpose is none other than to shake off various forms of intervention, allowing voters to exercise their will. This secret will is formed for many reasons—it may be righteous, but of course it could also be improper.

Conversely, for substantive motions, open-ballot voting is generally the principle. The rationale is equally clear: to require voters to bear clear political responsibility. Taking Article 129 of the Constitution as an example: 'The various kinds of elections prescribed in this Constitution, unless otherwise provided in this Constitution, shall be by universal, equal, direct and secret ballot.' The principle is a secret ballot.

Rules have exceptions. Under Article 3 of the Additional Articles of the Constitution, although a vote of no confidence by the Legislative Yuan against the Premier is a personnel-related motion, it is prescribed to be voted on by 'open ballot' in order to ensure clear political responsibility. Referring further to the *Law Governing the Legislative Yuan's Power*, when legislators review the President's emergency orders, presidential impeachment cases, and exercise consent powers over Grand Justices, Examination Commissioners, Control Commissioners, and the Auditor-General, all these are voted on by 'secret ballot.'

However, when legislators review the Executive Yuan's proposals for reconsideration, motions of no confidence against the Premier, and presidential recall motions, these are once again 'open ballot votes.' Reconsideration motions can be said to target substantive issues (such as the amendment to Article 99-1 of the Accounting Act), yet recalling the President and issuing a vote of no confidence against the Premier are both personnel-related issues.

Clearly, parliamentary principles are not set in stone; it all depends on whether we believe that voters should bear full and clear political responsibility for the voting results. Alternatively, are we willing to grant them greater leeway so they possess broader discretion without being constrained? The two major parties should first establish the rules of the game properly, rather than changing their mindset simply because their seats changed.

At the very least, at the level of local council speaker and deputy speaker elections, vote-buying and利益 exchanges have severely undermined the foundation of democracy and become intolerable to the entire citizenry. Demanding that councilors bear full political responsibility for their voting results should already be a consensus between the ruling and opposition parties. Therefore, the law should be amended as soon as possible to change elections for speakers and deputy speakers into open-ballot voting.

The Prosecutorial System at Its Wit's End

Only by clarifying the root of the problem can we turn around to evaluate the behavior of the prosecutorial system, which has been utterly at a loss. Investigating vote-buying is inherently the job of prosecutors, and no one would oppose this. The derivative problem is: vote-buying is difficult to catch; if prosecutors can only catch acts of 'ballot exposure,' is that excessive?

If it is understood that ballot exposure is not the core issue at all—and that whether a ballot is open or secret is—then prosecutors should know that open and secret ballots each have their own considerations, advantages, and disadvantages. They would then not spin in endless circles over the 'right or wrong' of ballot exposure. Furthermore, simply from ballot exposure / whether a ballot is open or not, it is fundamentally impossible to judge whether vote-buying has occurred. What on earth are prosecutors trying to investigate? What should be the core focus of their investigations?

If the prosecutorial power fails to think from a constitutional height and merely operates legal provisions in a formalistic manner, it will inexplicably get dragged into the whirlpool of controversy. Not only will this be unhelpful to resolving disputes, but it will instead damage its own credibility and image. The Supreme Prosecutors Office made a big deal out of it and even issued a press release, which conveniently became the 'most perfect' negative teaching material.

The theme of the press release was admittedly to demand that local prosecutors' offices 'strictly investigate vote-buying, violence, ballot exposure,' and other 'illegal activities.' However, what is baffling is that the Supreme Prosecutors Office equated 'ballot exposure' with 'vote-buying or violence.' Isn't this deduction far too 'naive and simplistic'?

Moreover, isn't there a suspicion of excessively intervening in the core domain of council autonomy? While Article 44 of the *Local Government Act* indeed stipulates that voting shall be conducted by secret ballot, it carries no relevant penalty provisions. To directly prosecute using the offense of divulging official secrets under Article 132 of the Criminal Code—wouldn't that be overly heavy-handed?

What about rigid party disciplinary actions by political parties? What about the political responsibility continuously blasted by the media and the people? Before any of this could ferment, it was slashed apart by a single stroke from prosecutors. Rushing out the rhetoric that 'secret voting is an important symbol of democratic democracy' without the slightest self-reflection—could the excessive intervention of prosecutorial power possibly be entirely free from the risk of destroying democratic politics?

To put it bluntly, the public's expectation of prosecutors is that, if they have the capability, they should directly catch those who buy and sell votes, rather than making value judgments without avoiding suspicion, without concealment, and without any sense of proportion over the side issue of whether to expose ballots or not. Having thrust their own hands in to stir things up for a long time, they still keep shouting at others: 'You are not allowed to reach your hands in!'

Deliberately acting as a hatchet man is, of course, the most despicable. But becoming a hatchet man out of ignorance while wielding such immense power makes the suffering of the people all too easy to imagine.