The indictment of first lady Wu Shu-jen (吳淑珍) on corruption and forgery charges in connection with the handling of the Presidential Office's "special state affairs fund" has resulted in public suspicion of President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) sincerity and honesty. Similarly, the investigation of Mayor Ma Ying-jeou's (馬英九) alleged involvement in the forging of receipts to write off his special allowance expenditures has tarnished his anti-corruption credentials.
In response to the Nov. 3 indictment, Chen offered an explanation in a televised speech blaming defective systems -- including the ambiguous regulations for the use of the special state affairs fund as well as frequent changes in the list of eligible writeoff items -- which resulted in confusion in the procedures for reporting the special fund.
The media portrayed Chen's speech as a lesson in sophistry. Conversely, the media painted Ma's alleged use of fake receipts for reimbursement of his expense funds as simply a result of systemic defects.
In fact, the special state affairs fund and the special allowance for government officials are similar in character.
When the president was involved, however, he was accused of corruption -- a clear demonstration that the accusations are ideologically driven. When other officials have similar problems with their special allowance funds, however, this is simply seen as a "bad habit" that should be legally regulated.
Suggestions for legal regulations for the president's "special state affairs fund" and senior officials' special allowance funds were first advanced by lawmakers several years ago.
Year after year, former Taiwan Independence Party legislator Lee Ching-hsiung (李慶雄) held question-and-answer sessions during the annual budget review looking at the corrupt nature of the special allowance funds. Former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislator Shen Fu-hsiung (沈富雄) proposed that the special state affairs fund and special allowance funds be included in the draft of the statute governing the president's, the vice president's, and special rank officials' pay for duty-related expenses.
However, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government did not accept Shen's proposal and the DPP continued the use of these funds after they came to power. If prosecutors conduct universal investigations on the use of the special allowance funds, it is possible that judges at all levels of the judiciary as well as prosecutors will be caught in the net.
The special state affairs fund is for use by the president for rewards and gifts, while the special allowance funds are for the use of officials from the vice president down to directors of local tax administration offices, elementary school principals and even chief judges at all levels and chief prosecutors.
In government agencies, however, the "general affairs expenses" item includes larger or smaller budget funds for gifts and public relations. This means that with the exception of government officials who are very generous with their public affairs spending, there will be "leftover funds" and those funds will find their way into officials' pockets as part of their salaries.
The special state affairs fund and the special allowance funds are a poisonous remainder of an earlier bureaucratic culture. They were used at events like banquets, weddings and for funeral gifts and special rewards for their personal retinue, amounting to the use of public funds to establish personal relationships, which clearly violates the principles of clean government.
This means that adding legal controls to these funds is no different from legalizing illegal practices. The funds should be removed altogether and the function and character of agencies should then be reviewed so that a certain amount of money that requires receipt for verification and writeoff can be allotted to each agency.
Salaries for the president, vice president, administrative officers, lawmakers and politically appointed officials continue to be based on the Temporary Act on the President's, the Vice President's and Special Rank Officials' Monthly Salary and Pay for Duty-related Expenses (
These acts use the gold yuan as a unit for calculating salaries, which is outdated and clearly inappropriate.
The salaries of the president, vice president, politically appointed officials and legislators should be based on the same standard as those of civil servants and depending on the needs of their positions they should be given varying expense accounts that do not require receipt verification. These expense accounts could be linked to the consumer price index.
Only by legally regulating the salary of the president, vice president and politically appointed officials and admitting that specific public funds are part of their salaries can the controversy over the special state affairs fund and the special allowance funds be avoided. This is the only way to further legal regulation.
Cheng Yun-peng is a Democratic Progressive Party legislator.
Translated by Lin Ya-ti
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) trip to China provides a pertinent reminder of why Taiwanese protested so vociferously against attempts to force through the cross-strait service trade agreement in 2014 and why, since Ma’s presidential election win in 2012, they have not voted in another Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate. While the nation narrowly avoided tragedy — the treaty would have put Taiwan on the path toward the demobilization of its democracy, which Courtney Donovan Smith wrote about in the Taipei Times in “With the Sunflower movement Taiwan dodged a bullet” — Ma’s political swansong in China, which included fawning dithyrambs