The legislature yesterday reached a resolution asking the government to suspend a plan to sell a stake of 15 percent in Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), the nation's biggest telecom operator.
The proposal to stop the sale was put forward by the People First Party (PFP), Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (
"Opposition lawmakers opposed the plan on the grounds it would mean selling state assets at cheap prices and benefiting certain conglomerates," Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Cheng Yun-peng (
Chunghwa Telecom on Monday tipped three investment banks led by Goldman Sachs Group Inc to manage an overseas shares sale, pushing one step further along the road to become a privatized company. Goldman Sachs will be the coordinator for the issuance of American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) equal to a maximum of about 1.35 billion common shares of Chunghwa Telecom.
The ADR issuance will make up a part of the government's broader plan to sell a total of 17 percent of its holdings in Chunghwa Telecom to lower its stake to below 50 percent, the threshold for state-run companies to qualify as privatized.
"We will carry on the planned overseas share sale unless the government decides to hold the deal," Chunghwa Telecom spokesman Hank Wang (王漢朝), told the Taipei Times yesterday.
Calls to the office of Chang Chia-chu (張家祝), vice minister and spokesman for the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, were not answered yesterday.
"The government can decide to obey the resolution or not," PFP Legislator George Hsieh (
"If the government decides not to obey the legislature's decision, that will destroy relations with opposition parties, making other government plans difficult to get through the legislature," he said.
The government is preparing to sell shares in China Steel Corp (
The government was forced to scrap plans to sell a stake of more than 15 percent in Chunghwa last year after the company's union threatened to strike over a benefits dispute.
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