Some of the remaining members of the self-styled "Million Voices Against Corruption" campaign were outraged to discover that their headquarters on Chongqing S Road has been closed without warning and that their erstwhile leader has left the country, the Chinese-language Apple Daily reported yesterday.
About 10 protesters gathered outside the locked metal door to protest on Wednesday, but were dispersed after campaign leaders called the police.
The office was closed just days after former Democratic Progressive Party chairman Shih Ming-teh (施明德), who had pledged to "imprison" himself in his apartment until President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) left office, traveled to the US on Feb. 15, reportedly for medical treatment.
Campaign spokesperson Chang Fu-chung (張富忠) said yesterday that Shih had undergone surgery for liver cancer.
Shih also plans to stop in Japan for media interviews on his way home early next month.
"The man who said he was going to `imprison' himself has instead taken his family to live happily in the US. Now where are his red-clad troops supposed to go?" one-time supporter Chu Cheng-hsien (朱成憲) asked, according to the newspaper.
Others said that the headquarters should be transformed into "Shih Ming-teh Memorial Hall."
Protesters pasted signs on the door calling Shih a "big liar" and "more vile than Chen and more shameless than [first lady] Wu Shu-jen (
The group also accused Shih of "swindling people out of their hard-earned money," by using the donations he collected to travel abroad with his wife.
However, Chang denied that Shih had used donated funds to finance the trip, and said that campaign leaders were only taking a one-week break. He said that details of how the campaign money had been spent have been posted on the group's Web site.
People can preregister to receive their NT$10,000 (US$325) cash distributed from the central government on Nov. 5 after President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday signed the Special Budget for Strengthening Economic, Social and National Security Resilience, the Executive Yuan told a news conference last night. The special budget, passed by the Legislative Yuan on Friday last week with a cash handout budget of NT$236 billion, was officially submitted to the Executive Yuan and the Presidential Office yesterday afternoon. People can register through the official Web site at https://10000.gov.tw to have the funds deposited into their bank accounts, withdraw the funds at automated teller
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