Former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday fought back after reports that Control Yuan member Chen Shih-meng (陳師孟) plans to question Taipei District Court Judge Tang Yue (唐玥) over the High Court’s decision to acquit Ma in July.
While stumping for Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidates in the Jan. 11 presidential and legislative elections in Hsinchu County yesterday, Ma berated Chen for the planned questioning of Tang.
Chen would be seriously interfering with the justice system, Ma said.
Photo: Liao Hsueh-ju, Taipei Times
Ma was acquitted of charges that he leaked classified information and breached telecommunications security law when dealing with wiretaps of two top lawmakers in 2013.
Chen has accused judges involved in the case of abusing the principle of judicial discretion and of passing judgement based on their political stance and personal bias.
Then-prosecutor-general Huang Shih-ming (黃世銘), who passed the information on to Ma, was found guilty, but did not have to serve a 15-month sentence and paid a fine instead, Chen said on Tuesday.
Chen has made statements about alleged misconduct, failures and corruption in the justice system, and the perception that judges favor wealthy people who hold political power.
“We can see from many cases … that Taiwan’s judiciary is not the last line of defense when it comes to upholding justice for the people. It is the preserve of conservative forces, the final stronghold of the one party-state’s political ideology,” Chen said, referring to the KMT.
Chen said that if there is no power authorized to monitor the justice system, then “judicial independence” is in reality “judicial dictatorship.”
The Judges’ Association of the Republic of China, as well as other organizations for judges and judiciary officials, have launched a petition protesting Chen’s remarks and released a statement saying that they would protect judicial independence from tampering by Chen and other Control Yuan members.
Chen served as a top aide to former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), and was deputy Taipei mayor and Democratic Progressive Party secretary-general.
He has been highly critical of the justice system, as it found Chen Shui-bian guilty of corruption, while Ma has been consistently cleared of corruption charges.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday voiced dissatisfaction with the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans- Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), whose latest meeting, concluded earlier the same day, appeared not to address the country’s application. In a statement, MOFA said the CPTPP commission had "once again failed to fairly process Taiwan’s application," attributing the inaction to the bloc’s "succumbing to political pressure," without elaborating. Taiwan submitted its CPTPP application under the name "Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu" on Sept. 22, 2021 -- less than a week after China
THE GOOD WORD: More than 100 colleges on both sides of the Pacific will work together to bring students to Taiwan so they can learn Mandarin where it is spoken A total of 102 universities from Taiwan and the US are collaborating in a push to promote Taiwan as the first-choice place to learn Mandarin, with seven Mandarin learning centers stood up in the US to train and support teachers, the Foundation for International Cooperation in Higher Education of Taiwan (FICHET) said. At the annual convention of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages held over the weekend in New Orleans, Louisiana, a Taiwan Pavilion was jointly run by 17 representative teams from the FICHET, the Overseas Community Affairs Council, the Steering Committee for the Test of Proficiency-Huayu, the
A home-style restaurant opened by a Taiwanese woman in Quezon City in Metro Manila has been featured in the first-ever Michelin Guide honoring exceptional restaurants in the Philippines. The restaurant, Fong Wei Wu (豐味屋), was one of 74 eateries to receive a “Michelin Selected” honor in the guide, while one restaurant received two Michelin stars, eight received one star and 25 were awarded a “Bib Gourmand.” The guide, which was limited to restaurants in Metro Manila and Cebu, was published on Oct. 30. In an interview, Feng Wei Wu’s owner and chef, Linda, said that as a restaurateur in her 60s, receiving an
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
RSS