Thu, Aug 25, 2016 page1

• Members named for assets committee

  TRANSPARENCY: Chairman Wellington Koo said Lin Che-wei would use experience with transparency groups to help improve communication via information technology

  • By Yang Chun-hui and Jonathan Chin / Staff reporter, with staff writer
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  Committee of Illegal Party Asset Settlement Chairman Wellington Koo (顧立雄) yesterday announced his picks for committee members, while confirming the appointment of Agency Against Corruption Deputy Director-General Hung Pai-ken (洪培根) as deputy chairman.

  Koo said he knows that the Ministry of Justice’s Prosecutors’ Personnel Review Committee opposed the appointment of Hung — who is to quit his post to join the committee when it becomes active next month — but Koo asked that prosecutors show “forbearance and understanding.”

  The post of assets committee secretary-general is to be filled by Chang Hung-tse (張弘澤), counselor of review and evaluations with the Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission, Koo said.

  Koo said he has appointed Lo Cheng-chung (羅承宗), associate professor of financial and economic law at Southern Taiwan University of Science and Technology, and Shih Chin-fang (施錦芳), former commissioner of the Pingtung County Government Tax Bureau, as full-time committee members, while a third full-time member would be appointed later.

  The committee’s eight part-time members are former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) spokesperson Yang Wei-chung (楊偉中); former Social Democratic Party legislative candidate Lee Yen-jong (李晏榕); Judicial Reform Foundation secretary-general Lin Che-wei (林哲瑋); National Chengchi University professor of history Li Fu-chung (李福鐘); accountant Jao Yueh-chin (饒月琴); and lawyers Wu Yu-hsueh (吳雨學), Yuan Hsiu-hui (袁秀慧) and Chang Shih-hsing (張世興), Koo said.

  Premier Lin Chuan (林全) gave him “a lot of latitude and trust” in the appointments, Koo said, quoting the premier as saying: “I have no objections whatsoever.”

  “Achieving a balance between the political parties was difficult, because committee members cannot hold positions in a party or be an elected representative, while pan-blue camp politicians I spoke to said the requirements put them in a difficult position,” Koo said. “In the end, the appointments were based on professional credentials and competence.”

  Koo said Lin Che-wei was selected because he was involved in government transparency groups, such as Watchout Co and online community G0V.tw, and is to assist in making committee operations more transparent and use information technology to better communicate with the public.

  KMT Deputy Secretary-General Lin Te-fu (林德福) said he had “no comment” on the appointments.

  He said that Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers practiced “majority violence,” using floor votes to quash dissent.

  He called the Act Governing the Handling of Ill-gotten Properties by Political Parties and Their Affiliate Organizations (政黨及其附隨組織不當取得財產處理條例) “illegal and unconstitutional.”

  KMT Legislator Sufin Siluko (廖國棟) said Koo is a “deep-green person” and the party asset settlement process will “predictably develop a complete pro-green bias.”

  The appointees are “controversial people” who will make reconciliation between parties “utterly impossible,” Sufin said.

  “Taiwanese society will become more fragmented and partisan because the committee is a source of chaos,” Sufin said.

  DPP Legislator Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) said the KMT should “face the facts and deal with [its assets] as soon as possible, instead of continuing with its futile resistance.”

  “If the KMT position is that the law is illegal or unconstitutional, it should specify what clauses are a breach of the law or the Constitution,” Lee Chun-yi said.
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