The Presidential Office yesterday dismissed allegations that President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) bodyguards had ordered employees of a movie theater that Ma visited on Saturday to chant slogans to welcome him.
Presidential Office spokesman Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) said that although local media reports had claimed that the request was made by one of Ma’s bodyguards, it was in fact made by the general manager of the movie theater, Chen Chun-ron (陳俊榮).
Lo said Chen asked his employees to greet the president on his way out to show their appreciation. Lo said he wished the media would check facts before printing stories.
With a headline saying that Ma’s bodyguard had ordered theater employees to “pat the horse’s behind” — to brownnose Ma, whose last name means horse in Chinese — the Chinese-language China Times said that one of Ma’s bodyguards ordered employees at Cinema7 in Taipei’s Ximending (西門町) to yell out: “How are you, Mr President; nice to see you, Mr President; goodbye, Mr President” when Ma came out of the theater.
Chen yesterday said he had asked his employees to shout greetings to Ma when the president was leaving the theater.
He said he told them to do so because the employees were taught to be polite to customers, adding that they welcome customers when they arrive and wish them well when they leave.
Chen said it was regretful that the media thought he was one of Ma’s bodyguards and did not check with him.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
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