A former Presidential Office accountant yesterday told a court in a case related to former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) embezzlement trial that former presidential aides were responsible for evaluating whether the former first family’s expenses could be approved for reimbursement from the presidential “state affairs fund.”
Lan Mei-ling (藍梅玲), a former Presidential Office accountant, was testifying at the Taipei District Court on the office personnel’s handling of the reimbursement and approval procedures for the presidential “state affairs fund,” money earmarked for use by the president for state affairs at his discretion.
Lan said although the fund was similar to the special allowance budget used by heads of government agencies, it could only reimburse expenses for “official uses,” not personal ones.
Presidential Office accountants are responsible only for processing paperwork, but presidential aides are responsible for approving the reimbursement slips that are used to draw cash from the fund, Lan said.
The “presidential aides” she was referring to are presumably former Presidential Office director Lin Teh-hsun (林德訓) and former Presidential Office deputy secretary-general Ma Yung-cheng (馬永成), both of whom are listed as defendants in the case for allegedly helping the former first family embezzle NT$104.15 million (US$3 million) in government funds.
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