After the March presidential election the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) broke a promise it made in 2000 and terminated a trust agreement in order to access funds which had previously been frozen. It also signed a letter of intent to sell the party-run Hua Hsia Investment Holding Co to the venture capital company Sycamore Ventures.
Most people in Taiwan strongly object to the deal, which could be worth as much as NT$1.7 billion (US$500 million) because a lot of the party's assets were improperly acquired. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) and many other organizations have repeatedly demanded that the KMT wait to sell any assets until the legislature passes the bill governing disposition of assets improperly obtained by political parties. They have said that once such legislation is enacted, the KMT can process those assets that were legally acquired while returning to the country those that were improperly obtained.
However, over the past two years, the KMT and the People First Party (PFP) have repeatedly blocked the bill from being listed on the legislative agenda. On Monday, a TSU version of the bill was rejected again, without even a chance for legislative debate. Obviously the KMT has no intention of returning its loot.
The KMT took over countless assets from the Japanese colonial government when it took control of Taiwan. During its time in office, it expropriated or received "donated" land from local governments, turning these plots into its "public service centers" in almost every township in the country.
The KMT's allied organizations -- such as the Broadcasting Corporation of China (BCC) -- purchased both buildings and equipment with government funds. Some of that property is now under
investigation while others have fallen into private hands.
According to figures released by the Ministry of Finance's National Property Bureau, real estate registered in the KMT's name includes 800 lots of land and 567 buildings, accounting for a total land area of 400,000m2. The BCC's real estate holdings include 112 lots of land and 69 buildings.
According to the government's valuation, all this land and buildings have a combined worth of NT$14 billion. Current market prices would actually take that figure to well over NT$20 billion. For many years the KMT had the reputation as the world's richest political party -- but NT$20 billion is a far cry from the estimated NT$80 billion the party had in 2000.
The KMT knows that a modern political party in a democratic country should not have such huge assets and that it is these assets that have firmly linked the party in the minds of many people to "black gold" politics. If the KMT continues to refuse to admit that a problem exists and does not act to return these assets to the people, it will be committing political suicide.
Come December, the people have the chance once again to show their displeasure with the KMT's miserly grip on public assets. If the pan-green camp wins a legislative majority, the bill on the political party assets will be passed. Then the KMT will be hard pressed to prevent the government from making an audit of its ill-gotten gains.
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