On Thursday night, former chairwoman of the Central Broadcasting System (CBS, 中央廣播電台) Chu Wan-ching (朱婉清), whose English name is Gloria, criticized prosecutors at the Taipei District Prosecutors Office (台北地檢署), accusing them of making an "unfair charge" of embezzlement against her. Then, her words still ringing in their ears, she boarded an EVA Air flight bound for Los Angeles that very night, two hours after posting NT$500,000 bail.
Chu has long been a controversial political figure. As a long-time close aide to Lien Chan (連戰), the former vice president and current KMT chairman, and a close friend of Lien's wife, Lien Fang Yu (連方瑀), Chu was very fortunate in her official career.
Because of her connections with the Lien family, Chu's career followed Lien Chan's fortunes closely and she became a high-ranking official in the Executive Yuan after Lien took office as premier.
She recently stepped down as the CBS chairwoman after the new government took power.
Chu is a smart, aggressive, and capable woman who has helped the Lien family publicly and privately. Some even call her the "housekeeper" (管家) of the Lien family.
On the other hand, Chu's over-enthusiastic or over-aggressive personality has often invited trouble and made enemies for both her and the Liens and has sometimes been harmful to the former vice president.
A few years ago, for example, when former KMT secretary-general John Chang (
Later, during Lien's trip to Jordan in 1998, Chu spread word that it was her diligent private negotiations with Jordanian officials that had enabled the trip to be made, which greatly offended KMT heavy-weight Jason Hu, the minister of foreign affairs at the time.
Although many of the government officials were not happy about Chu's actions, they often gave precedence to her due to her special connections.
Chu's friendship with the Lien family, however, appears to have changed dramatically in recent years. Lien's friends are known to have repeatedly urged him to keep his distance from her, seeing her as a troublemaker. Even Lien's children have privately criticized Chu for her rampant ambition.
A few years ago, Chu insisted on nominating Lien Fang Yu for a national award in literature (
After Lien became vice president in 1996, Chu was appointed by Lien to chair CBS in order to remove her from the political scene. Chu complained about the post, asking how Lien could send her "to such a god-forsaken place."
In February, as the presidential election entered its final phase, Chu caused more problems when she applied for an injunction to ban the book My Taiwan Trip and Lien Chan's Presidential Fortune (我的總統路和連戰的總統運), written by the famous Chinese fengshui (風水) master Li Jianjun (李建軍).
In the book Li claimed that Chu had introduced him to Lien so that he could work on the vice president's fengshui and improve his political career. Lien and his wife were derided by the media for being superstitious. In Lien's own words, "She has brought me big trouble again."
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