Allegations of administrative neutrality violations are being leveled as the Nov. 27 special municipal elections draw near. Following accusations that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) slipped Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin’s (郝龍斌) campaign slogan into the inauguration of the Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system’s Luzhou (Lujhou) Line on Wednesday, another accusation has surfaced implicating Council of Agriculture (COA) Deputy Minister Huang Yu-tsai (黃有才).
Huang was accused of breaching administrative neutrality regulations by e-mailing two articles in support of Hau, who is a member of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), during work hours.
The articles commented on the ongoing investigation into alleged irregularities surrounding the -Xinsheng Overpass project. The accusers said Huang sent out the two articles titled “A few thoughts on Hau Lung-bin and the Flora Expo” and “How Taipei could surpass itself if there were no political squabbling,” on Oct. 22 at 5:44pm and Nov. 2 at 5:02pm with the help of Hsu Ming-yi (徐明宜), a special committee member working in the minister’s office.
The e-mails were sent using the COA’s e-mail address and during work hours, the accusers said.
In the article about the Flora Expo, Huang said: “The fact that some people will argue about whether NT$500 (US$16.55) for some water spinach is too expensive shows you how serious the situation really is.”
In the other article, Huang commented on the ongoing investigation into the alleged irregularities surrounding the overpass project, saying he thought city employees surely must feel wronged for being misunderstood, blamed and implicated in lawsuits.
This was not the first time Huang has been accused of breaching administrative neutrality. During the county commissioner and mayoral elections last year, at a press conference called by the KMT’s legislative caucus, Huang responded to the issue of stagnant sales of oranges brought up by a KMT county commissioner candidate by saying that oranges would be sold to China and then having the COA buy 20,000 tonnes of oranges.
In response to press inquiries, Huang said there was no violation of administrative neutrality as the articles were written during his day off and it was Hsu’s personal decision to forward the articles he e-mailed to him.
When asked for comment, Hsu also said there was no violation of administrative neutrality, saying: “Can’t one take care of e-mails during office hours?”
He added that he merely forward the articles and did not force recipients to read them or give their support.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Pan Meng-an (潘孟安) said that since the COA had given the Taipei International Flora Expo NT$3.5 billion in subsidies, the council should supervise expenditures at the expo instead of acting as a Taipei City spokesperson.
Saying that rice farmers must sell almost 5kg of rice to be able to buy a pack of cigarettes and that Pingtung onion farmers have had all their onion seedlings drenched by natural disasters — problems the COA has failed to alleviate — Pan said the deputy minister and a special committee member should better invest their working time caring for the interests of farmers.
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