The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has made a serious mistake with its handling of the Chen Ying-chu (陳盈助) controversy, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) vice presidential candidate Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) said in a radio interview on Sunday.
Chen is alleged to have met President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), who is running for re-election, during one of Ma’s campaign stops on Sept. 10. The DPP said this was proof that the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) presidential candidate has close affiliations with organized crime.
Some say the DPP is using slander to steal the KMT’s thunder because it produced a better legislator-at-large list of candidates than the DPP, Wu said, adding that the KMT’s list included disadvantaged representatives, professionals and civil administrators.
Some of the DPP’s candidates have criminal records, irregular private lives or bad character, Wu said, adding that the list had made a bad impression.
Wu said Ma had a tight schedule on Sept. 10 and that he was an honest person, and had made public his list of meetings for that day.
The DPP’s inflammation of the controversy only highlights its shortcomings, Wu said, adding that the party’s “baseless claims” that Ma received NT$300 million (US$9.8 million) from Chen had violated political norms.
Wu said that despite DPP slandering, DPP legislators Chen Ming-wen (陳明文) and Tsai Chi-fang (蔡啟芳) said that Chen Ying-chu was a “good person,” in evident contrast with the party’s official stance.
“People are saying, how can the party [the DPP] act like this, claiming that [Chen Ying-chu] is a ‘good person’ when they want to use him, only to slander him when they want to accuse Ma of raising campaign funds from Chen Ying-chu. What kind of party is it that doesn’t even face the truth,” Wu said, adding the DPP “would reap what it sowed.”
The incident in question was reported in the Chinese-language China Times on Saturday amid allegations by KMT legislator Chiu Yi (邱毅) that Chen Ming-wen had asked Chen Ying-chu to “look out for” Tsai in June when she embarked on a fund-raising trip to the Philippines.
Turning to the issue of subsidies for elderly farmers, Wu said the KMT’s decision to raise the farmers’ subsidy by NT$1,000, following its original proposal to raise the subsidy by NT$316, was because a NT$1,000 raise was more fair.
Responding to DPP criticism that the KMT had made a copycat about-face, Wu said that if one wanted to be a copycat, the DPP could copy the KMT by putting forward a good legislator-at-large nomination list.
Wu called for clean elections and said Taiwan’s democratic transformation had won the country admiration from nations the world over.
Even though there was a shooting before last year’s special municipality elections, voting proceeded peacefully the next day, Wu said, referring to the shooting of Sean Lien (連勝文), the eldest son of former KMT chairman Lien Chan (連戰).
“An election should be a competition between gentlemen, with the winner doing his or her best as president,” Wu said.
Translated by Jake Chung, Staff Writer
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