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Lawmakers angry over Tu's continued absence

Angered by what they said was Minister of Education Tu Cheng-sheng's (杜正勝) neglect of his duty to report to the legislature, pan-blue and pan-green lawmakers on the Education and Culture Committee yesterday threatened to slash the ministry's annual budget this year.

For the third time since last week, Tu failed to appear before the committee despite being ordered by the committee's convener, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Diane Lee (李慶安), to report in person to the committee on what lawmakers said were important issues ranging from the ministry's plans to rename the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall and demolish its perimeter walls to its policies promoting Mandarin, Taiwanese, Hakka and Aboriginal languages in schools nationwide.

"He's not coming again?" said KMT Legislator Kuo Su-chun (郭素春) after learning that Tu would not attend yesterday's meeting.

"Well, don't come begging us to pass your budget later then," she told Vice Minister of Education Chou Tsan-der (周燦德), who came in Tu's stead. "Perhaps, we'll just bypass your ministry altogether and dispense education funds directly to schools if Minister Tu won't submit to legislative oversight."

Taiwan Solidarity Union Legislator Chen Yin-ho (陳銀河) echoed Kuo's threats, saying Tu's absences reflected a broader trend of the Democratic Progressive Party government's evasion of legislative oversight. Chen didn't elaborate.

Tu missed a meeting on Tuesday and failed to notify the convener of his expected absence, Lee said.

Chou told the Taipei Times, however, that Tu had submitted an official request to skip yesterday's meeting because of a function.
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