I read in the papers the other day that Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇) has proposed a revision to the Environmental Impact Assessment Act (環境影響評估法). This revision proposes that the government allow companies to continue construction work on, or operations of, all development projects that have had their initially successful environmental impact assessments (EIA) subsequently overturned by the courts. This is ostensibly based on the principles of promoting public interests and honoring initial guarantees made to the companies.

Wu freely admitted that this proposal, which had its first reading in the legislature on Friday last week, was put forward specifically to address the controversy surrounding the third-phase expansion of the Central Taiwan Science Park. It was obviously inspired by President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) Double Ten National Day address and, earlier, his speech at the National Industrial Development Conference on Aug. 19.

It was here that Ma first mentioned a Supreme Administrative Court ruling that construction work on the third and fourth phases of the science park should be suspended, in the context of his opinion that the judges should have taken into account Article 117 of the Administrative Procedure Act (行政程序法) and Article 198 of the Administrative Appeals Act (行政訴訟法). If they had, Ma said, they would have taken into consideration the greater public interest and would not have revoked the EIA results. This would have guaranteed the companies’ investments, too — according to his line of reasoning.

Directly equating a private company’s construction costs and investment with public interests is debatable at best. On Sept. 6, 2007, the Supreme Administrative Court handed down Ruling No. 1601 on an appeal concerning the Linnei Township (林內) incinerator construction project. The reason given then is identical to that given for overturning the EIA for the science park. Nothing has changed since then.

Basically, the court ruled that the plant’s construction costs could not be directly equated with public interests and other social costs needed to be factored in before any decision could be made. As to whether the company involved was liable to receive any compensation, that was considered to be an entirely different matter. Any other ruling would have instantly legitimized the unconventional way the government had proceeded.

This time round, the court ordered the suspension of work on the third phase of the Central Taiwan Science Park. In Ruling No. 2032 on Sept. 2, it threw out an appeal by the National Science Council, citing a number of reasons including the judges’ opinion that a company’s plant construction and operations are to be considered its private business and have nothing to do with the public interest. This is from page 17 of the ruling.

There was nothing ambiguous about it. Ma’s not stupid, he has a doctorate in law from Harvard and he leads the KMT government. So why haven’t there been questions about how an EIA — supposedly made by an authoritative body — was unable to get past the judiciary, and why has it been thrown out of court time and again? Instead, the administration has resorted to revising the law in order to leapfrog the courts. It seems intent on making what Environmental Protection Administration Minister Stephen Shen (沈世宏) said on Oct. 2 come true. Shen had called the judges’ ruling meaningless and irrelevant.

From  TaipeiTimes ：http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2010/10/23/2003486668

Date: 2010/10/25  PM 15:44