A probe into whether President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) had received NT$200 million (US$6.44 million) in illegal political donations from Ting Hsin International Group (頂新國際集團) and other large amount donations from other business conglomerates has been closed without charges, the Special Investigation Division (SID) said.
Making the announcement at a news conference yesterday, SID spokesperson Kuo Wen-tung (郭文東) said the probe of the president had ended without investigators obtaining sufficient evidence to support the charges.
Kuo also said that an investigation of charges that former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) received illegal donations was closed without charges due to insufficient evidence.
SID is part of the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office and is in charge of conducting judicial probes on corruption and offenses of malfeasance at highest level of government, including the president, vice president, government ministers and presidents of the five yuans.
The charge against Ma was made by talk show host Clara Chou (周玉蔻), who in December last year said that Ma received an off-the-books donation of NT$200 million from Ting Hsin International Group.
Chou subsequently cited a report from my-formosa.com (美麗島電子報) that Ma received NT$1 billion from Ting Hsin, along with other large donations from companies in the high-tech sector.
Kuo said investigators summoned 110 individuals as witnesses in Ma’s case and pored over a massive amount of documents and other evidence, as well as examining relevant bank account records.
However, Chou said she was not surprised by the decision.
“This is a holiday gift for Ma, just in time for the Dragon Boat Festival, sent up by SID by the prosecutor-general who was appointed by Ma,” Chou said.
In a statement released yesterday, Chou accused the division of carrying out an investigation that was full of holes and lacked logical reasoning.
“Taiwan’s judiciary system is now dead; the cause of its death is in the hands of Ma as the president. This SID report showed that Taiwanese people’s many years of struggle to achieve the current democracy is now entering another era of darkness and terror,” she said.
“Ma has placed the SID, judicial system, government administration and intelligence apparatus under his firm control. Ma is using every devious means available to ensure he can escape judicial prosecution and jail time when his presidency is over,” Chou said.
She urged that the case against Ma be reopened with a new investigation after the presidential election next year.
In the case against former president Chen, the allegation was made by former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) spokeswoman Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) during a public speaking tour of the US earlier this year.
During a speech in Dallas, Texas, in February, Hsu said Chen accepted billions of New Taiwan dollars as political donations from real-estate developers and construction companies.
When questioned by prosecutors, Hsu said she heard the information from a company owner, but she did not know the person and could not remember the date or venue of the meeting.
Investigators said they questioned Chen’s aides and checked the flow of funds in Chen’s corruption and money laundering cases, but could not find the money mentioned by Hsu.
Pundits said the division announced its findings in the cases at the same time to avoid charges of political bias and government interference in the judicial process.
Additional reporting by CNA
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