Premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) yesterday said that the government will ask those who combined their years of service in the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and in government jobs when they applied for pensions to return the money so accrued, as it does not belong to them.
"Now that it is illegal, we will ask them to pay [the money] back," Hsieh said at yesterday's weekly Cabinet meeting.
Hsieh was referring to a decision by the Examination Yuan on Tuesday that former KMT officials' combining their service years as KMT employees and civil servants during the KMT's rule when they applied for their pensions is illegal.
Hsieh also requested his Cabinet members to stop paying the extra money to retired KMT officials immediately.
"Whoever does so will be regarded as violating the law," he said.
High-ranking KMT officials will be asked by the government to pay back the money personally. However, as far as lower-ranking KMT officials are concerned, the government will ask the KMT to pay the money for them if they cannot afford it.
Cabinet Secretary-General and Spokesman Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) and Minister Without Portfolio Lee Ying-yuan (李應元) had also been assigned by Hsieh to visit the KMT headquarters to work out the details surrounding this matter.
"We are trying very hard to maintain a spirit of fairness," Hsieh said.
KMT Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday said that his party will abide by the laws regarding the issue, but whether counting party work experience as public service was legal was a matter for the Examination Yuan and the Ministry of Civil Service to decide.
"The rules were made by the Examination Yuan and so the right to make any changes belongs to it. The premier's words alone do not count," Ma said.
Ma said that including time spent in party service in public service experience was a product of the martial-law era when one party ruled the country. The practice was carried out from 1971 and abolished in 1987 with the lifting of martial law.
"The KMT has no comments about any decisions made by the Examination Yuan and we are willing to abide by the law. As to whether the practice was legal, since the Examination Yuan passed it before, it should know best if it was legal," he said.
Meanwhile, People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (
Huang Shan-shan (黃珊珊), Soong's lawyer, yesterday said that DPP Chairman Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) should also shoulder part of the responsibility and requested that the DPP apologize in print and electronic media for three days in a row, as well as make public the full text of the court ruling.
Huang said that DPP secretary-general Lee Yi-yang (李逸洋) and DPP spokesman Cheng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) last Sunday accused Soong of earning two salaries while serving as a secretary at the Presidential Office while doubling up as the director of the KMT's Cultural Affairs Department between September 1984 and June 1989.
PFP caucus whip Hwang Yih-jiau (
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