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Special funds amnesty plan omits Chen

By Flora Wang and Mo Yan-chih
STAFF REPORTERS
Saturday, Jul 12, 2008, Page 3

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Lin Yi-shih (林益世) said yesterday that he planned to propose special draft legislation that would relieve government chiefs who had been accused of misusing their special allowance fund of legal liability — except for the president.

The draft bill states that the use of special allowance funds by all government chiefs and deputy chiefs until the end of 2006 should be considered legal.

The draft bill states that any charges of forgery and other criminal violations related to using the funds prior to Dec. 31, 2006 should be dropped.

However, the proposal would not apply to the use of the president’s “state affairs fund.”

Several former government officials from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), including former vice president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) and former premier Yu Shyi-kun, have been indicted for allegedly misusing their special allowance funds, while several KMT officials are under investigation.

Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and his wife Wu Shu-jen (吳淑珍) were accused of corruption and forgery in the “state affairs” fund case.

When approached for comment, Lin said the proposal reflected his personal opinion, not the caucus’ resolution.

“For a very long time, we have sought to resolve this [special allowance fund] controversy,” Lin said.

“A previous caucus meeting authorized the [KMT’s] Policy Research Committee to work on how to solve the problem through legislation. After careful consideration, I hereby propose this special draft bill,” he said.

Lin’s move was not the first effort the legislature has made to resolve the controversy.

In May, the DPP proposed an amendment to the Accounting Act (會計法) that stipulated all government chiefs who have asked for reimbursements from their special allowance fund or “state affairs” fund with receipts before dated May 31 should not face any liability.

Although the KMT caucus regards the special allowance fund scandal as a “historical glitch” and recognized the need to deal with it, the caucus was opposed to the DPP proposal as the bill included the presidential “state affairs” fund.

The KMT caucus has not reached a consensus on Lin’s proposal.

When approached by reporters, KMT Legislator Chiu Yi (邱毅) expressed his disagreement.

Chiu said it was right to discuss canceling government chiefs’ liability that resulted from an unclear definition of the fund.

“But how can they be relieved of their liability if they used other people’s receipts to claim reimbursement from the fund? This was a matter of corruption,” he said.

In response to the proposed law, Lu said the issue of government officials’ special allowance should have been handled a long time ago, while urging the government not to target Chen alone.

Lu suggested that prosecutors look into all former presidents’ handling of special allowance funds if the KMT insisted on investigating Chen’s case.

“The Special Investigation Unit has been doing nothing but looking into our cases. It’s not fair to ask the DPP to shoulder the responsibility for administrative flaws,” Lu said during a press conference at the Democratic Pacific Union’s office in Taipei.

DPP legislator Gao Jyh-peng (高志鵬) said that the KMT proposal was obviously designed to single out Chen.

“This is some kind of revenge, as far as I can see,” Gao said. “For me, the special allowances and the president’s state affairs fund are both special allowances. There is no difference.”

Additional reporting by Jimmy Chuang
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