Vice President Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) yesterday said he would apologize if it was found that the installation of pipelines that caused a series of explosions in Greater Kaohsiung last week preceded a suspicious culvert constructed during his tenure as the city’s mayor.
The catastrophic explosions that occurred late on July 31 in the municipality have been attributed to leaks in a pipeline that was carrying propene.
The pipeline was first said to have been installed in a culvert that it should not have passed through, and LCY Chemical Corp (李長榮化工), the pipeline’s suspected owner, was accused of illegally installing it.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
Two other companies, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and China Petrochemical Development Corp (中石化), also have pipelines running through the culvert.
It has been suggested that the leak leading to the explosion could have been caused by corrosion to pipes from water in the culvert.
As it was later found that the culvert itself was off the grid, questions are being asked about who is responsible for building the culvert and whether it was constructed before the pipelines were installed.
If the pipelines were installed after the culvert was constructed, it is suggested that the agency or building company that approved and supervised the installation of the culvert should be held responsible for the explosions.
Greater Kaohsiung Deputy Mayor Wu Hong-mo (吳宏謀), whose resignation was approved yesterday, was the head of the design section of the Public Works Bureau’s Hydraulic Engineering Office which approved the culvert’s construction in November 1991. The culvert was completed in October 1992.
The pipelines found in the culvert were installed in April 1991.
Vice President Wu Den-yih was Kaohsiung City mayor from 1990 to 1998.
The vice president said yesterday that if the local government is to blame for the mistake, “I would have to apologize as the then-mayor. To be honest, there was still a public works bureau director and a sewage system office chief under me, but I certainly feel unsettled as the mayor [at the time] who led and coordinated the municipal administration.”
“It would be left to the prosecutors to find out which was established first, the culvert or the pipelines. If it was the pipeline owners who made the holes through the culvert, the city government’s sewage system office would be off the hook,” he said.
However, “if there was responsibility to be held [on the government’s part], it would be the lack of inspection [of pipelines] in the past years,” he added.
Prosecutors confirmed yesterday that the construction contractor had failed to follow a building plan for the culvert, which resulted in the culvert passing through where pipelines had been installed, but the mistake was not duly corrected.
The then-sewage system office is suspected of forging documents, seeking to gain illegal benefits from a function under its supervision, but since the alleged offenses were committed more than 20 years ago, officials cannot be charged, prosecutors said.
However, as the explosions, which led to fatalities and injuries, were caused by failed supervision and inspection of the construction, the officials could be prosecuted for causing death by negligence and causing a catastrophe by neglecting their duties, as the limitation period for these offenses has not yet passed.
NATIONAL SECURITY THREAT: An official said that Guan Guan’s comments had gone beyond the threshold of free speech, as she advocated for the destruction of the ROC China-born media influencer Guan Guan’s (關關) residency permit has been revoked for repeatedly posting pro-China content that threatens national security, the National Immigration Agency said yesterday. Guan Guan has said many controversial things in her videos posted to Douyin (抖音), including “the red flag will soon be painted all over Taiwan” and “Taiwan is an inseparable part of China,” while expressing hope for expedited “reunification.” The agency received multiple reports alleging that Guan Guan had advocated for armed reunification last year. After investigating, the agency last month issued a notice requiring her to appear and account for her actions. Guan Guan appeared as required,
Japan and the Philippines yesterday signed a defense pact that would allow the tax-free provision of ammunition, fuel, food and other necessities when their forces stage joint training to boost deterrence against China’s growing aggression in the region and to bolster their preparation for natural disasters. Japan has faced increasing political, trade and security tensions with China, which was angered by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s remark that a Chinese attack on Taiwan would be a survival-threatening situation for Japan, triggering a military response. Japan and the Philippines have also had separate territorial conflicts with Beijing in the East and South China
A strong cold air mass is expected to arrive tonight, bringing a change in weather and a drop in temperature, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The coldest time would be early on Thursday morning, with temperatures in some areas dipping as low as 8°C, it said. Daytime highs yesterday were 22°C to 24°C in northern and eastern Taiwan, and about 25°C to 28°C in the central and southern regions, it said. However, nighttime lows would dip to about 15°C to 16°C in central and northern Taiwan as well as the northeast, and 17°C to 19°C elsewhere, it said. Tropical Storm Nokaen, currently
PAPERS, PLEASE: The gang exploited the high value of the passports, selling them at inflated prices to Chinese buyers, who would treat them as ‘invisibility cloaks’ The Yilan District Court has handed four members of a syndicate prison terms ranging from one year and two months to two years and two months for their involvement in a scheme to purchase Taiwanese passports and resell them abroad at a massive markup. A Chinese human smuggling syndicate purchased Taiwanese passports through local criminal networks, exploiting the passports’ visa-free travel privileges to turn a profit of more than 20 times the original price, the court said. Such criminal organizations enable people to impersonate Taiwanese when entering and exiting Taiwan and other countries, undermining social order and the credibility of the nation’s
RSS