Sat, Mar 21, 2009 page3

• GIO threatens to relieve Kuo of civil servant status

  • By Shih Hsiu-chuan / STAFF REPORTER
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  The Government Information Office (GIO) yesterday issued a statement saying it may relieve Toronto-based official Kuo Kuan-ying (郭冠英) of his civil servant status if he refuses to return to Taiwan.

  Kuo, who returned to Canada on Tuesday to hand over his work to a colleague, is alleged to have written articles smearing Taiwan and Taiwanese under the pen name “Fan Lan-chin (范蘭欽).” He was required by the GIO to return to Taiwan by the end of this month.

  To calm the furor caused by the allegation, the GIO removed Kuo from his position as acting director of the information division at Taiwan’s representative office in Toronto and transferred him back to the GIO in Taiwan, while waiting for the Judicial Yuan’s Commission on the Disciplinary Sanctions of Functionaries to determine whether Kuo was Fan.

  However, Kuo was quoted by the Chinese-language United Evening News yesterday as saying that he would not return to Taiwan until the commission has settled his case and ensured his personal safety.

  The United Evening News reported that Kuo said he had recently been harassed by Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) supporters in Toronto and he had reported the cases to the police in Canada.

  Canadian police told Kuo that he could seek political asylum in Canada, but Kuo said that he did not consider that necessary, the evening paper said.

  Kuo was not available for comment on the report.

  The GIO statement yesterday said that if Kuo did not appear at the GIO on the required date, it would constitute a violation of Article 2 of the Civil Servants Work Act (公務人員服務法), which states civil servants have the obligation to follow superiors’ directives.

  Kuo’s failure to return to Taiwan would also constitute a violation of Article 12 of the Civil Service Performance Evaluation Act (公務人員考績法), which states that a civil servant who fails to comply with the government’s directives could receive two major demerits and be discharged. One implication of this could be that the person in question would not be eligible for a pension.

  Also yesterday, dozens of protesters led by Huang Chin-lin (黃慶林), director of the DPP’s Taipei branch, Taiwan Association of University Professors chairman Tsai Ting-kuei (蔡丁貴) and a number of Taipei City councilors staged a demonstration outside the GIO.

  The protesters demanded that GIO Minister Su Jun-pin (蘇俊賓) step down if the GIO could not give a clear account of the incident, dismiss Kuo and have him prosecuted.

  The allegations were made on March 11 by DPP Legislator Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲), who accused Kuo of being Fan. Fan’s blog carries numerous articles containing offensive remarks belittling Taiwan and Taiwanese people.

  The articles refer to Taiwanese as taibazi (台巴子, “Taiwanese rednecks”) and wokou (倭寇, “Japanese pirates”). The articles say that “[China] should spend many years suppressing [people in Taiwan] instead of granting them any political freedom once it has taken Taiwan by force,” and called Taiwan “neither a country nor a province, but a ghost island.”

  Kuo said he described himself in a newspaper essay as a “superior Mainlander” but denied he was Fan.

  DPP lawmakers have demanded that Kuo be stripped of his job rather than just demoted. Some lawmakers from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) have also said the GIO should do more about Kuo’s case.

  ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY STAFF WRITER AND AP
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