Editorials
Election change is limited
(China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-10 07:59
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Domestic media tend to interpret Clause 11 in the draft amendment to the Law on Election that will replace Article 33 of the existing legislation as a requirement for election organizers to expose candidates for national and local legislatures to their constituencies.
Until now, candidates in such elections have been introduced to their constituencies via dryly succinct bios provided by organizers. Without proper knowledge as to whom they are choosing from, even the multiple-candidate arrangement appears cosmetic: Voting will be more like guesswork.
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It will establish an essential yet thus far absent link between our citizens and their legal representatives. Absent any connections, all rhetoric about voter supervision sounds hollow.
We can see the drafters' aspiration to install the missing link. But they do not seem to have traveled far enough down that direction.
Just take a look at the old and new texts. Article 33 of the Election Law says: "Electoral committees may organize candidates for deputies to meet voters, and answer their questions." This shows that the idea of such meetings exists in the current law, and that it is an option, not an obligation.
Clause 11 of the draft amendment states: "Electoral committees, at voter request, shall organize candidates for deputies to meet voters, and the candidates for deputies shall introduce themselves and answer voters' questions."
We do see a step forward here. Yet it should have been bigger. The revision has spelled out a legal obligation, but with a precondition - only when voters ask for an interview.
Given the obvious necessity and benefits of such meetings, there are thousands of reasons to exempt our voters from that trouble of request. We wonder why the drafters have instead made it an obligation by request.
(China Daily 03/10/2010 page9)
