Print

Mail

wiki links

Ma accused of pocketing funds

Chinese Nationalist Party legislators yesterday put Unified Invoice Lottery slips in a box, calling on the public to collect them to help the Presidential Office make up for allegedly embezzled funds through the bi-monthly receipt lottery. PHOTO: WANG YI-SUNG, TAIPEI TIMES

Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) came under fire from Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers yesterday for allegedly pocketing public funds.

The allegations came in the wake of opposition charges that the first lady had embezzled a secret Presidential Office slush fund.

A group of DPP legislators told a press conference yesterday that half of the Taipei mayor's special monthly allowance of NT$170,000 (US$ 5192) had been remitted into his personal account for private use.

"We received information that half of Ma's special allowance expenditure is deposited into his personal account every month, which might contain irregularities as nobody knows how he spends it," DPP Legislator Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) said.

Audit demanded

DPP legislators went to the Ministry of Audit later yesterday, demanding that the government watchdog look into Ma's special allowance expenditures in the same way it did with the Presidential Office's slush fund.

"We met with Auditor-General Su Chen-ping (蘇振平) and he told us that it's inappropriate to deposit a government chief's special allowance expenditure into his personal account. Su told us that he himself wouldn't do so," DPP Legislator Huang Wei-cher (黃偉哲) said.

The ministry on Thursday disclosed its audited result of the Presidential Office's special allowance fund on the governmental financial statements, saying 76.76 percent of the expenditure last year had not been reimbursed in conformity with related regulations.

"Su told us that the ministry will look into Ma's special allowance expenditures and get back to us next Friday," DPP Legislator Hsieh Hsin-ni (謝欣霓) said.

Sharp asset increase

The DPP legislators also questioned Ma's integrity based on the mayor and his wife's property disclosure in the Control Yuan's report.

According to the report on property disclosure of public servants, Ma and his wife's salary totaled NT$27.07 million from March 1999 to December last year, and their real estate assets increased by NT$26.6 million during the same period, Hsu said.

"How were Ma and his wife able to save so much in six years? Not to mention the fact that they can afford to send their two daughters to study in the US," Hsu said.

In response, the Taipei City Government was quoted as saying in a CNA story said that remitting half of the mayor's special allowance expenditure to his personal account was in accordance with a document issued by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics.

In other developments, People First Party (PFP) legislators yesterday filed a lawsuit against the president, first lady Wu Shu-jen (吳淑珍), the director-general of the Presidential Office's accounting department Fon Shui-lin (馮瑞麟) and other related officials.

Corruption

PFP Legislator Lu Hsueh-chang (呂學樟) said the way the Presidential Office dealt with the reimbursement for Chen's special allowance funds implied that Chen, Wu, Fon and other officials might have violated the "Corruption Penal Act" (貪污治罪條例).

Lu added that the PFP caucus was considering proposing a motion to impeach the president in the next legislative session, which will start on Sept. 19.

The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus remained cautious about the suggestion, however.

KMT Legislator Pan Wei-kang (潘維剛) said that one can impeach the president only if he had committed an act of treason.

Additional reporting by Jewel Huang
This story has been viewed 2189 times.