Former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator Chang Sho-wen (張碩文), whose election victory was annulled on vote-buying charges, urged the KMT yesterday not to be ungrateful to his family after the KMT’s Yunlin chapter disqualified his father from a legislative by-election because of his alleged involvement in his son’s vote-buying.
He accused Yunlin prosecutors of conspiring to frame his father Chang Hui-yuan (張輝元), head of an irrigation association in Yunlin, as part of their investigation into the vote-buying allegations.
Chang Sho-wen showed a press conference at the legislature video footage of a conversation between a lawyer and a witness in his father’s case, in which the lawyer says they must “discuss with prosecutors what to say against Chang Hui-yuan.”
PHOTO: CHANG CHIA-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
“[Prosecutors] fabricated witness statements and colluded [with witnesses] in Chang Hui-yuan’s case,” Chang Sho-wen said. “Mr Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said he hoped future politicians will have integrity, ideals, love for the people and principles. Doesn’t Chang Hui-yuan fit the profile?”
Chang Sho-wen was found guilty of election bribery at his first trial in Yunlin. Prosecutors alleged that his father solicited votes for his son by offering cash bribes to voters during last year’s legislative elections.
The Tainan branch of the Taiwan High Court annulled Chang Sho-wen’s election victory on June 30 on the ground that he was aware of and had taken part in the vote-buying scheme allegedly organized by his father. The annulment was a civil suit.
Chang Hui-yuan, who is in his 70s, then registered in the KMT’s primary for the by-election.
The KMT’s Yunlin chapter ruled in a preliminary review on Sunday to disqualify Chang Hui-yuan as a result of the party’s “black gold exclusion clause,” which states that members who are found guilty of corruption in their first trial cannot to be nominated for any elections.
“We could have announced that we would run as an independent candidate, but we would rather not do that because we did not do anything wrong,” Chang Sho-wen said.
“We are faithful party members. I cannot be ungrateful to the KMT, but if the KMT chooses to be ungrateful to us, we will have no choice but to follow the voice of grassroots supporters,” he said.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
RSS