The military once again denied yesterday media reports that it had made special arrangements for President Chen Shui-bian's (
The military called a special press conference to clear up what it called "untrue reports" about Chen's passing the reserve officers' examination, arguing that there are fair and objective reasons for raising the number of slots in particular categories of reserve officers after exam results are announced.
Six generals attended the press conference, which was quite unusual. These generals included a three-star general, three two-star generals and two one-star generals.
PHOTO: CHEN CHENG-CHANG, TAIPEI TIMES
The military held the high-profile press conference in response to a report by the Chinese-language China Times newspaper.
Deputy Chief of the General Staff General Wang Han-ning (
The China Times said that to curry favor with the president, Tang instructed his subordinates to have the number of reserve officer positions raised in favor of Chen's son.
If it had not been for Tang's efforts to please the president, the number of reserve officers in the category of judge advocates would not have been raised from two to ten, the report said.
If the number of positions had been kept at two, Chen's son would not have made the grade.
The China Times found the move suspicious because the military raised the number of reserve officer positions for judge advocates right after the reserve officers' exam was held in February.
Lieutenant General Chen Ti-tuan (
Chen explained that since some students pass the reserve officers' exam before graduating from the university, the military needs to wait and see how many of those people will graduate and be available for service before finalizing the number of new reserve officers needed.
"We do this because we cannot know before the exam how many reserve officers we need for different branches of the military. This is a technical problem," Chen said.
"In the future, however, we will find a way to settle the number of positions for all categories of reserve officers before the exam is held," he said.
Chen added that the president's son needed no favors in passing the reserve officers' exam since his scores were far higher than the scores needed to pass, even though he fell below the top two highest scores for judge advocates.
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