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The PFP's mission is to bring down Lee

`All the PFP wants is to get Lee and avenge the damage Soong suffered as a result of the Chung Hsing Bills Finance scandal.'

Bringing down former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) has become the PFP's primary mission. The entire party, from top to bottom, has been mobilized to bring Lee to his knees. What a fascinating spectacle.

While highlighting the escape of former National Security Bureau (NSB) chief cashier Liu Kuan-chun (劉冠軍) and the leak of confidential documents from the bureau and the Farmers Bank of China (FBC, 農民銀行), the PFP neither questions the horrifying NSB funding "black hole," nor the impropriety of the FBC violating a confidentiality clause by revealing the so-called "scandal."

All the PFP wants is to get Lee and avenge the damage Soong suffered as a result of the Chung Hsing Bills Finance (中興證券) scandal.

While visiting an offshore island, PFP Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) praised Pao Ching-tien (包青天), probably the most famous judge in Chinese history. Then, apparently comparing Lee with Pao, he lashed out at a certain "Pao Hei-tien" (包黑天), who, he said, has the DPP and the TSU as his bodyguards. He condemned the two parties for protecting "Pao Hei-tien."

Obviously, the person Soong targeted with the leaking of confidential information from the NSB and the FBC is Lee. In other words, all the so-called "confidential documents," whether they exist or not, are just weapons in a series of political battles.

The worship of Pao Ching-tien is a product of the imperial era, a time when there was no concept of due legal process. Soong's admiration for Pao demonstrates his lack of respect for the rule of law. Everyone in Taiwan remembers perfectly well the extent of the corruption revealed in the Chung Hsing scandal. Does Soong really think that the judicial system has declared him innocent in the matter?

With the scandal still casting a very long shadow, Soong's relentless efforts to give Lee a taste of his own medicine are clearly part of a combative political strategy. How can anyone still hold Soong up as an expert in the art of politics?

More importantly, the PFP's mission to bring down Lee indicates that there is not really any major conflict in Taiwan any more, which suggests that the ruling party can now concentrate on reviving Taiwan's economy. As the PFP focuses on this so-called scandal, the ruling party also gets a chance to clean up the government inside and out.

As for the FBC, some say that it has close relations with the KMT's military intelligence unit. If this is the case, are the alleged secret accounts and money transfers real or fabricated? Exactly how was the confidential information of account holders at the FBC leaked to the PFP?

The government must act decisively to give the people of this country and comprehensive explanation, and to get rid of the baggage left behind by the former authoritarian regime.

Chin Heng-wei is editor-in-chief of Contemporary Monthly magazine.
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