Fri, Aug 13, 2004 page3

• Taichung's Guggenheim funding dispute drags on

  • By Debby Wu / STAFF REPORTER
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  Taichung City's proposed Guggen-heim Museum branch became the focus of the legislature's extra session yesterday as legislators and Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) expressed concern over the fate of the project, but Premier Yu Shyi-kun said the pan-blue camp had obstructed the entire process in the first place.

  Guggenheim is one of the projects provisionally included in the Executive Yuan's NT$500 billion 10 key infrastructure projects package, but the Cabinet has only prepared NT$36.5 billion for two ongoing projects: the "third-generation highway" and MRT systems in northern, central and southern Taiwan.

  "Premier Yu promised me that he will work hard to allow the special budget for the museum to be prepared for next year, and that it will be sent to the legislature for review together with the annual budget for next year," Wang said. "The premier also said that the government was willing to help the museum with capital flow until the end of this year."

  Wang said that after the Executive Yuan submitted the budget plan to the legislature, he suggested to Yu that it make an amendment to include the budget for the Guggenheim.

  He said that after the amendment was sent to the legislature, the amendment could be passed and the budget granted.

  "But Premier Yu said to me that it was difficult to push the amendment through, that there was no rush now and that the Executive Yuan could wait a bit longer before it prepares the special budget for the museum next year," Wang said.

  He also said Yu promised that if the museum needed funding for planning and other preparatory work, the government would be willing to help it.

  Two days ago legislators from Taichung City also questioned Yu over why the Executive Yuan failed to prepare the budget for the museum this year.

  high threshold

  Yu blamed the situation on the pan-blue camp for setting a high threshold in the Special Statute for Increasing Investment in Public Construction (擴大公共建設投資特別條例), which requires a number of evaluations to be made, including on alternatives for major projects.

  Yu also said that the Taichung City Government had failed to complete a report on an alternative plan before a deadline this year.

  Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) responded angrily to Yu's comments two days ago, saying that his government had finished the required evaluations.

  "The central government has failed to deliver on its promise and keeps on using different excuses," Hu said. "An alternative? What do we replace the Guggenheim Museum with? The British Museum?"

  NO QUORUM

  In related news, the extra legislative session continued yesterday with amendments to the controversial Farmers' Association Law (農會法) and the Fishermen Asso-ciation Law (漁會法) failing to be reviewed after the Economics and Energy Committee failed to reach a quorum.

  The amendments, proposed by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus, aim to loosen up restrictions on convicted criminals taking up posts in the associations.

  KMT Legislator Hsu Shu-po (許舒博) expressed anger over the failure and blamed it on Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) maneuvering.

  Most of the absent committee members were DPP legislators.

  "The DPP caucus agreed to discuss the bills in the extra session during inter-party negotiations, and the bills that were to be discussed in the session were also agreed on," Hsu said.

  "The committee did not have to pass the bill, but at the least we had to discuss them," Hsu said. "The DPP caucus cannot be selective about the bills they want to discuss or pass up on."
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