President-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) should make a pledge to show her incoming administration’s determination to address the issue of the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) ill-gotten party assets, academics said yesterday.
Critics have labeled the KMT’s assets “ill-gotten” because the party took them from the Japanese colonial government, private businesses and individuals when it took control of Taiwan in the late 1940s.
Despite several bills proposed at the legislature on “ill-gotten party assets,” academics said they are worried about the actual result of the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) campaign to pursue the matter, as the issue is politically sensitive and highly polarized.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Lo Cheng-tsung (羅承宗) of the Zero Party Asset Alliance said the incoming Tsai administration does not have to wait until the legislation is passed to pursue the KMT’s illegitimate party assets.
He said that although the DPP was a minority in the legislature when former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) was in power, and there was no legislation on the issue, the Ministry of Civil Service was already checking on the KMT’s assets.
Therefore, the first thing Tsai should do when she is sworn in is to have the government continue such work based on what has already been accomplished, while updating information on the Executive Yuan’s Web site.
Huang Shih-hsin (黃世鑫), an honorary professor at National Taipei University’s Department of Public Finance, said that Tsai should clearly declare her determination in pursuing the KMT’s assets and make legislation on KMT assets a priority in the legislature. Moreover, if a commission on ill-gotten assets is created, it should immediately ask the KMT to submit relevant documents, or the party headquarters should be searched, adding that there should also be clauses to provide awards to whistle-blowers from within the party, he said.
Hsu Hui-feng (許惠峰), a law professor at Chinese Cultural University, said that as the DPP holds an absolute majority at the legislature, it should integrate different versions of proposals to take care of the issue as quickly as possible and exempt those who were involved in handling ill-gotten party assets from criminal responsibilities so that they cooperate.
Lo said organizations affiliated with the KMT, such as the China Youth Corps and the National Women’s League of the Republic of China, should be pursued as “organizations whose personnel, finance or operations are currently or have been under the control of a political party” as stipulated in the New Power Party’s proposal.
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