Legislators across party lines criticized Friday’s announcement of the removal of Taiwan High Prosecutors’ Office head prosecutor Chen Shou-huang (陳守煌) as an attempt to help President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) eliminate Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平).
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lu Hsueh-chang (呂學樟) said the evidence collected by the legislature’s Discipline Committee suggested that Chen did not violate the Prosecutors Code (檢察官守則) because his failure to report Wang’s alleged lobbying request constituted only a minor flaw.
“The ministry has clearly blown the matter out of proportion …especially given that Prosecutor-General Huang Shih-ming (黃世銘) still sits comfortably in his post,” Lu said.
Lu was referring to a telephone call Wang made to Chen on June 27 allegedly asking him to prevent Taiwan High Prosecutors’ Office prosecutor Lin Shiow-tao (林秀濤) from appealing the acquittal of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) in a breach of trust case.
Chen’s removal came after the ministry’s Prosecutor Evaluation Committee concluded on Dec. 14 that he was involved in the lobbying case and should be given a demerit.
The committee also recommended that Huang be dismissed from his post for his unconstitutional reports to Ma about details of an ongoing investigation into the alleged lobbying case.
KMT Legislator Liao Cheng-ching (廖正井) said the ministry should have transferred Chen to a similar position, rather than disgracing him by downgrading him to an ordinary prosecutor.
KMT Legislator Wang Huei-mei (王惠美) said the committee would not have recommended just a demerit for Chen if it had found him guilty of improper lobbying.
“The purpose of founding the independent committee … is to prevent ministry officials from covering up for each other, but maybe it should be disbanded now that the ministry does not seem to honor its decisions,” Wang Huei-mei said.
DPP Legislator Pan Men-an (潘孟安) said given the eagerness of pro-Ma media outlets to declare Wang Jin-pyng guilty of undue lobbying following the committee’s decision, the ministry’s quick removal of Chen could have been an attempt to sabotage the speaker’s chances of winning a lawsuit regarding his KMT membership.
“If the plot succeeds, Ma will finally be able to remove Wang Jin-pyng from the speakership and eliminate all ‘obstacles’ to his pandering to China,” Pan said.
Wang Jin-pyng was stripped of his party membership on Sept. 11 due to alleged improper lobbying, but he is allowed by a court decision to retain his membership until the lawsuit is settled.
DPP Legislator Wu Ping-jui (吳秉叡) said the ministry’s efforts to hunt down anyone not on its side indicated that Minister of Justice Lo Ying-shay (羅瑩雪) was nothing but Ma’s political hitman.
“On the one hand, the ministry defended Huang despite the committee’s recommended dismissal, and on the other, it removed someone who should only have received a demerit,” Wu said. “How can we ever trust a ministry which has such dramatic double standards?”
Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) was sentenced to six months in prison, commutable to a fine, by the New Taipei District Court today for contravening the Personal Data Protection Act (個人資料保護法) in a case linked to an alleged draft-dodging scheme. Wang allegedly paid NT$3.6 million (US$114,380) to an illegal group to help him evade mandatory military service through falsified medical documents, prosecutors said. He transferred the funds to Chen Chih-ming (陳志明), the alleged mastermind of a draft-evasion ring, although he lost contact with him as he was already in detention on fraud charges, they said. Chen is accused of helping a
SECURITY: Starlink owner Elon Musk has taken pro-Beijing positions, and allowing pro-China companies to control Taiwan’s critical infrastructure is risky, a legislator said Starlink was reluctant to offer services in Taiwan because of the nation’s extremely high penetration rates in 4G and 5G services, the Ministry of Digital Affairs said yesterday. The ministry made the comments at a meeting of the legislature’s Transportation Committee, which reviewed amendments to Article 36 of the Telecommunications Management Act (電信管理法). Article 36 bans foreigners from holding more than 49 percent of shares in public telecommunications networks, while shares foreigners directly and indirectly hold are also capped at 60 percent of the total, unless specified otherwise by law. The amendments, sponsored by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ko
The eastern extension of the Taipei MRT Red Line could begin operations as early as late June, the Taipei Department of Rapid Transit Systems said yesterday. Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said it is considering offering one month of free rides on the new section to mark its opening. Construction progress on the 1.4km extension, which is to run from the current terminal Xiangshan Station to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, was 90.6 percent complete by the end of last month, the department said in a report to the Taipei City Council's Transportation Committee. While construction began in October 2016 with an
NON-RED SUPPLY: Boosting the nation’s drone industry is becoming increasingly urgent as China’s UAV dominance could become an issue in a crisis, an analyst said Taiwan’s drone exports to Europe grew 41.7-fold from 2024 to last year, with demand from Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression the most likely driver of growth, a study showed. The Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET) in a statement on Wednesday said it found that many of Taiwan’s uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) sales were from Poland and the Czech Republic. These countries likely transferred the drones to Ukraine to aid it in its fight against the Russian invasion that started in 2022, it said. Despite the gains, Taiwan is not the dominant drone exporter to these markets, ranking second and fourth
RSS