President pardons Bunun hunter
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday pardoned a Bunun hunter charged in 2013 with killing protected animals, on the first anniversary of her second presidential term.
The pardon of Tama Talum, convicted in 2015 for killing a Reeves’ muntjac and a Formosan serow with a modified shotgun, is the first pardon of Tsai’s two terms since 2016 and the seventh since the enactment of the Constitution on Dec. 25, 1947.
Talum was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison for possessing an illegal weapon and hunting protected species. He appealed, and in 2017, the Supreme Court suspended the hearing, but asked the Council of Grand Justices to review hunting regulations under the Controlling Guns, Ammunition and Knives Act (槍砲彈藥刀械管制條例) and the Wildlife Conservation Act (野生動物保育法).
The Council of Grand Justices on May 7 ruled in Constitutional Interpretation No. 803 that some restrictions on Aborigines were unconstitutional, but stopped short of supporting a total overhaul of the regulations.
The Supreme Court yesterday said that although Talum was pardoned from serving his sentence, it would need to follow procedure until the case is closed, as verdicts from the lower appellate courts still stand.
Presidential Office spokesperson Kolas Yotaka, an Amis, said the decision carried significant weight, especially amid the government’s efforts to promote historical and transitional justice for Aborigines.