Several Taipei city councilors yesterday alleged that the city government attempted to shift the responsibility for resolving issues surrounding the Taipei Dome complex to them by sending a liaison officer to conduct a poll at their offices and leaking the results — which said that about 60 percent of city councilors were in favor of demolishing the Dome.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Chen Li-hui (陳孋輝) told the council that the liaison officer on Monday presented her and her counterparts with three options — demolish the Dome, dissolve the contract or resume construction — and asked them to pick one.
She said the liaison officer later leaked the survey results to a news outlet, leading to the publication of the information, adding that yesterday morning she received a telephone call from a resident asking for her opinion on the Dome’s future.
Online news outlet Storm Media reported that 27 of the 61 city councilors surveyed supported terminating the contract, four said the Dome should be demolished, 15 said the city should adhere to its contract with contractor Farglory Group, while the rest abstained.
“Does the city government want to avoid its responsibility and expect the city council to clean up after it?” Chen said.
KMT Taipei City Councilor Chin Huei-chu (秦慧珠) said she was not in her office when the liaison officer visited, so the liaison asked one of her assistants for their opinion.
Chin said the city government was trying to “set up” the councilors as scapegoats if there is any public criticism of the decisionmaking process over the NT$30 billion (US$926.44 million) project.
People First Party Taipei City Councilor Vivian Huang (黃珊珊) said she was absent when the liaison went to her office.
“I want to relay my office director’s reply to the liaison: ‘Which idiot sent you to ask these questions?’” she said.
Taipei City Council Speaker Wu Pi-chu (吳碧珠), a KMT member, asked Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) to apologize for what she called the Ko administration’s attempt to shift the responsibility for the Dome to city councilors and for leaking the results of the survey, which she said might result in the city councilors being misrepresented.
Ko complied. He also said that the survey queries were “mock questions” and the results were not supposed to be released.
“The results cannot fully represent the city council’s stance. I apologize for the trouble this has caused you,” Ko said.
He said that he would ask relevant agencies to investigate the leak and deliver a report to the council.
Taipei Deputy Mayor Teng Chia-chi (鄧家基), the main liaison between the city government and the city council, said that investigation results would be released by Monday.
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