The Control Yuan released a report yesterday on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' (MOFA) donation to South Africa's African National Congress (ANC) under Nelson Mandela in 1994.
The Control Yuan said that based on its task force's investigation, the ministry borrowed from a National Security Bureau (NSB) sectret fund to give a donation to the ANC, and, when the ministry reimbursed the NSB, it paid more than the amount of the original loan.
The Control Yuan blamed flawed accounting procedures for the discrepancy.
"The case came to the attention of the public because the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported a different amount for the donation from the amount the ministry reimbursed to the National Security Bureau. After a comprehensive investigation, we found the gap resulted from unclear accounting procedures," Chao Ron-yaw (
Chao and his colleague, Ma Yi-kung (
The case was investigated after the media revealed that the money donated to the ANC came from an NSB secret fund which was handled by Liu Kuan-chun (劉冠軍), the former NSB chief cashier who fled the country in September 2000 after allegedly embezzling NT$190 million from NSB funds.
Since the amount of money donated was not clear, it prompted speculation among reporters that irregularities were involved.
According to the report, the correct amount of the donation was US$10.32 million, which the NSB advanced to the MOFA to give to the ANC. In 1999, however, the MOFA reimbursed the NSB US$10.7 million.
"The NSB sent the MOFA an advance in 1998 for another diplomatic purpose, but the MOFA listed the expenditure under the same accounting title as the ANC donation, and that is how the gap resulted," said Ma.
Control Yuan members thus concluded in their report that the MOFA's accounting procedure did have flaws and that the MOFA should not borrow money from the NSB because the NSB's slush fund is not supervised by the Legislative Yuan.
The MOFA made the donation because former president Lee Teng-hui (
The MOFA, however, did not budget for the donation in 1994.
Chao said, the MOFA should have followed the government's standard procedure to draw on existing reserves rather than borrow money from the NSB, said Chao.
He added, "we hope that the MOFA will improve its accounting procedures."
The Control Yuan is still investigating the flow of money from the secret NSB accounts to see whether irregularities were involved.
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