A Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) faction yesterday attacked Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) officials for counting the years they worked for the KMT before entering public office to help qualify for generous retirement benefits.
"Why do they deserve to get that?" asked DPP Legislator Gao Jyh-peng (
"The KMT is clearly mixing its party coffers with those of the state and it is a venomous legacy of the authoritarian era," he said.
Citing the example of KMT Vice Chairman Kuan Chong (關中), Gao said 10 years of Kuan's "civil service" was in fact spent working for the KMT.
While the KMT should have been paying retirement contributions for the time he worked there, taxpayers are instead bearing the burden, Gao said.
Gao also singled out former Presidential Office secretary general Ding Mao-shih (丁懋時), former Judicial Yuan president Shih Chi-yang (施啟揚), former minister of transportation and communications Lin Feng-cheng (林豐正), former Control Yuan president Wang Tso-jung (王作榮) and Loh I-cheng (陸以正), a former ambassador to South Africa, as have taken advantage of the tactic.
DPP caucus whip Jao Yung-ching (
While the 18 percent preferential interest rate given to civil servants "deserved immediate review," DPP Legislator Chen Tsiao-long (陳朝龍) criticized the pan-blue alliance for twisting the DPP government's "good intentions" and creating tension between the government and civil servants.
Vice Minister of Civil Service Wu Tsung-cheng (吳聰成) said it is legitimate for retirees to count the time they worked at the KMT because a KMT government order in December 1971 legalized the practice. The decree, however, was nullified in 1987 for civil servants who were yet to retire.
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