KMT says its assets protected by law

As debate continues unabated over the KMT's business assets and how they should be handled, President Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) and other party officials yesterday denied the assets could be "purged" as some opposition politicians have suggested -- arguing they were legally registered and therefore protected by the law.

"It's all nonsense. We are not going to sell them [the assets], but entrust them," Lee said to reporters as he walked into the party's weekly central standing committee meeting yesterday morning.

"The assets are legal property under the protection of the law," he said.

During yesterday's meeting, the party took its first concrete steps to settle the controversy over its hundreds of billions of dollars in assets by formally establishing a task force to handle their entrustment. KMT Secretary-General Huang Kun-huei (黃昆輝) is to head up the task force.

Party spokesman Huang Hwei-chen (黃輝珍) also attacked the notion that the assets could be "purged."

Based on the current situation, the KMT's assets are all legally registered in the party's name, he said.

"Purging cannot be done -- otherwise, how many years of history should be traced over? One hundred or 200?" he asked.

"The rule of law is the basis of democracy and reform should also be based on that law," Huang said. "The opposition claims that they are pursuing democracy, but reform should be done with regard for the law; otherwise, they will be bringing disorder to society, which is the opposite of democracy's intentions.

"According to the civil code," Huang said, "those who make a claim on something bear the responsibility of providing the evidence to support their claim."

"They [the opposition] cannot write a new law to deprive the KMT of its lawful assets," he said.

But such views have not gone unchallenged.

"If the KMT's assets are legal, why should Lien Chan call for reform?" asked Chang Ching-hsi (張清溪), an economist at National Taiwan University and long-time observer of KMT assets. "What is legal in form is not necessarily legal in substance.

"The KMT, as a ruling party running the government, formally legalized assets grabbed by illegal means," Chang said, citing as an example buildings and land that were public property under Japanese colonial rule that now turn out to be held by the KMT.

"That does not mean that the party legally holds the assets," Chang said, "This is a political issue rather than a legal one.

"In short," he said, "this is a problem that could not possibly be resolved unless the KMT loses power."

DPP legislators have also alleged that the KMT has been trying to sell off party assets, cheaply if necessary, in order to avoid pos-sible confiscation by a new government.

Opposition figures claim the sources of the KMT's assets were mostly the government in the first place.

DPP presidential candidate Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) has vowed to "purge (清算)" the KMT's assets and return them to the government and the people if he is elected in March.

Lien's spokesman, KMT lawmaker and finance professor Eric Chu (朱立倫), said that such suggestions could not be taken lightly.

"The assets of the party belong to the party; you cannot liquidate them without the party's agreement," Chu said.

Chu said that up to this point, the DPP has failed to come forward with any hard evidence. "Don't give me some newspaper or some rumor, give me real evi-dence," he said.