Hau yesterday confirmed that KMT Secretary-General King Pu-tsung (金溥聰) had met with him and gave advice regarding the issue, but refused to go into the details.
Taipei Deputy Mayor Lin Chien-yuan (林建元), a deputy convener of the task force, said the city government has paid the contractor NT$1 billion for the project, whose total budget was NT$1.3 billion.
COMPENSATION
The city government will ask for compensation in accordance with the contract after the final investigation confirms the contractor’s responsibility.
Commenting on the controversy yesterday, DPP Taipei mayoral candidate Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) urged the Taipei City Government to face up to all these problematic issues with honesty.
Stressing the importance of a decision-maker’s attitude, Su said that if a decision-maker acts as if the problem has nothing to do with him, any subordinates would then be inclined to adopt a similar attitude and dismiss the issue as a “small negligence.”
“There are no incompetent soldiers, only an incompetent general,” Su said.
On Friday night while attending a Taiwan Solidarity Union election campaign activity, former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) brought up the ongoing dispute over the expo and said that “when the price of a flower differs by a hundred times, it is no longer a small matter.”
The mayor could not claim that he did not know anything, said Lee, adding that the mayor should take responsibility.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY STAFF WRITER



