Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Lin Yi-shih (林益世) yesterday rebutted media allegations that he pressured customs officials in Kaohsiung after his father’s complaints about their treatment of fellow passengers, who had tried to avoid paying duty on excess cigarettes, were ignored.
“The whole thing is absurd,” Lin said. “Who would dare to blame public officials when they do their job right?”
The Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) reported yesterday that the legislator allegedly called the customs office at Kaohsiung International Airport to express his “concerns” after customs officials refused to listen to Lin’s father, Lin Hsien-pao (林仙保).
The elder Lin and his wife were returning from a trip to Hong Kong on June 14 when two village chiefs who had been on the same flight were found to have foreign cigarettes that they had not declared to customs, the report said. When customs officials checked the luggage of other passengers on the same flight, they discovered 12 with undeclared cigarettes, the newspaper said.
Although the Lins had not bought cigarettes and had already passed through customs, they returned and identified themselves in a bid to help the other passengers, the report said.
Customs officials ignored Lin Hsieh-pao’s plea and left him standing in front of the customs counter as they processed and fined the violators, the report said.
The legislator later called the customs office and asked Lin Wen-chung (林文忠), a division director, to apologize to his father in person.
Lin Wen-chung yesterday confirmed that he had visited Lin Hsieh-pao.
However, he said he did so only because his superiors believed there was room for improvement in terms of customs officials’ interactions with passengers.
“It had nothing to do with the fact that he is Legislator Lin’s father,” Lin Wen-chung told reporters yesterday.
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