The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) will oppose any government attempt to seize its assets, the party said yesterday in response to a report in a Chinese-language newspaper.
The newspaper reported yesterday that the ministry was considering taking temporary measures or provisionally seizing KMT assets to prevent the party from selling off chunks of party businesses before investigations into their origins are completed.
The report sparked angry responses from the KMT and denials from the ministry yesterday, with the KMT accusing the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) of overplaying the assets controversy to win the year-end legislative elections.
Responding to the report, Chang Che-chen (張哲琛), director general of the KMT's administration and management committee, said yesterday that the news was just another example of the DPP's drive to win the legislative elections at any cost.
"The DPP has always played the party-assets card during elections. This year, however, their tactics have been the most ruthless yet," Chang said yesterday at a press conference.
He said this was not the sort of thing that a law-abiding, democratic administration should do.
Lee Yung-ran (李永然), a managing partner of the law firm Y.R. Lee & Partners, also attended the press conference to argue why the seizing of assets would not hold up in court.
"A provisional seizing of assets or provisional measures are used when a creditor is worried that a debtor is seeking to dispose of his or her assets. Thus steps are taken to secure the assets," Lee said yesterday.
"However, the KMT and the government do not have a debtor-creditor relationship. Should the government seek to take provisional measures or provisionally seize party assets, the KMT will appeal, and if the measures were taken or the assets seized in error, liability payments will have to be paid by the public on behalf of the government," he said.
Potential difficulties in implementing the seizing of KMT assets also seems to have been taken into account by officials at the ministry.
Although the finance ministry had considered seizing the KMT's assets or taking provisional measures against the party, Minister of Finance Lin Chuan (林全) said yesterday that it had long ago decided against the move because it did not have the funds for a reclamation bond.
Were the government to provisionally seize the assets, it would have to give the KMT a bond amounting to at least one-third of the value of the assets seized, Lin said.
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