The Cabinet's ad hoc Memorial Foundation of the 228 Incident (
"It's the ultimate wish of the victim's families to make the ad hoc organization into a standing one, so it can continue to provide them with services," said Lee Wang-tai (
The 228 Incident is named after a rebellion against the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) venal and brutal rule which broke out on Feb. 28, 1947.
The protests were violently suppressed and successive KMT governments covered up what happened, labeling the incident a "mutiny" and charging that the victims were "mobsters" controlled by the Communists.
Today the mission of the 16-member foundation is to visit victims' families and to issue compensation when deemed appropriate.
According to the statistics made available by the foundation yesterday, it has distributed more than NT$6.8 billion to nearly 8,195 victims' families.
Since its establishment in 1995, the foundation has received 2,555 compensation claims. Of those, 2,052 -- or about 85 percent -- have been deemed valid; while 365 -- or about 15 percent -- have been either been denied because of insufficient evidence or are pending further review.
The idea of transforming the foundation into a standing body came to light after the Executive Yuan had informed the foundation of its planned rejection of the foundation's request to do so.
The Cabinet claims that such a move is unnecessary because the major task of the foundation is issuing compensation to victim's families. The Cabinet is expected to make the decision official today in its meeting. It is scheduled to approve the amendments to the Statute of Handling Compensation for the Victims in the 228 Incident.
According to the planned amendments, the foundation -- which was scheduled to expire in July this year -- would have its life extended to July 2010. The deadline for compensation applications would also be extended -- from July 2005 to July 2010.
The statute has been amended five times over the past eight years in order to extend both the deadline for applying for compensation and the life of the foundation.
Lee, however, said that the consent of the Executive Yuan would no longer be an issue if all the preparation work for the foundation's transformation into a permanent organization are fully in place in the next two to three years.
"To that end, we have to be financially independent," Lee said.
"We're thinking of halving the number of employees, further cutting employees' salaries, encouraging early retirement and looking for a new office venue," Lee said.
The foundation operates on the interest generated from the compensation funds that the Cabinet earmarks for the victim's families. The foundation's monthly operating expenses amount to about NT$3 million.
Originally staffed with 19 people, the foundation has already cut that number down to 15.
Lee said that he is thinking of reducing the number of employees to seven and eventually replacing the current staff with those who have backgrounds in culture or education.
To further save costs, Lee said the foundation might further trim employees' salaries.
The foundation has already slashed workers' monthly salaries by 8.68 percent, starting Sept. 1.
Lee, however, was pessimistic about the implementation of the salary-cutting scheme.
"Nobody likes the idea of having their salaries cut," Lee said.
"The first wave of salary cuts in September has received a lot of backlash from the staffers and dampened their morale," Lee said.
The foundation is also working on formulating an early retirement program and hopes to hammer out a concrete program within two to three months.
Finally, the foundation plans to relocate to new offices -- preferably a government building that is currently unused -- in order to save on rent. The foundation currently pays about NT$2.9 million for office rental.
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