Former National Palace Museum (NPM) director Feng Ming-chu (馮明珠) was accused of changing a rule so that she could receive higher fees for giving speeches, after she came under fire earlier this week for changing a regulation to shorten the time period during which retired museum officials are barred from visiting China after leaving their posts.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) said he found out that Feng, before leaving office, increased the fee that could be paid to museum directors for giving speeches from NT$1,600 per 50 minutes to NT$6,500, the highest of three levels, with NT$3,200 at the lowest level, NT$5,000 for ministry department heads and NT$6,500 for ministers or national museum directors — Taiwanese or foreign.
Chen said the change has led to different standards of pays for academic speakers.
Photo: Lin Yi-chang, Taipei Times
According to the Civil and Teaching Staff Multi-duty Transportation and Seminar Hourly Fee Regulations (軍公教人員兼職交通費及講座鐘點費支給規定), officials from the five government branches can be paid up to NT$800 per speech, while those hired from outside are paid NT$1,600 per 50 minutes.
Following Feng’s change, museum directors became an exception receiving pay of up to NT$6,500, Chen said, criticizing the practice as “corrupt.”
The museum determines fees for speakers according to the categories of “general lecture” and “lecture by a specialized speaker,” NPM Deputy Director and spokesperson Lee Ching-hui (李靜慧) said.
She said that general lectures are defined as those given by professionals not working of any of the government branches, for which pay is set at NT$3,200 for a 90-minute speech, while specialized lectures are paid at one of the three rates of NT$8,000, NT$6,500 and NT$5,000.
Feng changed the regulations while in office and raised the pay rate for the instructors of a creative arts lecture series that she scheduled and at which she was an instructor.
This is in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act (行政程序法), which specifies that “related parties should of their own volition refrain” from activities they have influence over, Lee said, adding that the museum would review compensation standards.
Among the three pay rates for specialized lecturers, the least controversial is the first level, which is paid to Nobel Prize laureates, Academia Sinica members or those who carry similar honorable titles from foreign institutions, Lee said.
“If we can get a Nobel Prize laureate to come and speak for NT$8,000 then that is already a bargain,” she said.
She said that the other two categories are ambiguously defined, only requiring a speaker to be the director of “an important museum, domestic or foreign” for the second category, and “a professional of a level comparable to department head of a state body” for the third category.
“There are cultural relic museums everywhere. Do we consider these to be important or not? And is it not too lax to call all current and former state department heads ‘people of specialized positions?’” she asked.
Lee added that it is unseemly for Feng to create a category that categorizes her as person of rank.
“Normally in this type of situation there would be a clause that strictly eliminates oneself from inclusion, but there is no such clause,” Lee said.
The museum would rectify the portions of the speaker pay rate standards that are unclear or do not conform with legislation, Lee said, adding that she acknowledges that from Feng’s perspective the change seek to attract a wider range of “heavyweight” speakers.
Feng was hired as a research adviser by the research institute of Beijing’s Palace Museum earlier this month, less than four months after stepping down from the Taipei post, which has stirred up controversy.
She said on Monday that she would soon come back to Taiwan, but did not specify when, for an investigation over the allegations leveled against her.
China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokesperson Ma Xiaoguang (馬曉光) on Wednesday said that Feng’s position at the Beijing museum is “a pure academic exchange.”
Additional Reporting by CNA
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