The tainted oil scandals involving Chang Guann Co and Ting Hsin Oil and Fat Industrial Co have had a major negative effect on the nation’s food industry.
When the heavy 22-year prison sentence meted out to Yeh Wen-hsiang (葉文祥), chairman of the old and well-established oil brand Chang Guann, was finalized, he drank detergent in an apparent attempt to take his life, although the hospital reported that he was not in a critical condition.
Leaving aside speculation about whether Yeh was trying to postpone the start of his sentence, there is another interesting aspect of the case.
Former Ting Hsin chairman Wei Ying-chung (魏應充) was also accused of mixing inferior oil into the company’s products, but while Yeh was sentenced to 22 years in prison, Wei was given a not-guilty verdict.
The discrepancy raises concerns about the impartiality of the judiciary.
Yeh and Wei were accused of mixing inferior oil into their company’s products and of violating Article 15 of the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法), which stipulates that foods or food additives that, among other things, have been adulterated or counterfeited should not be manufactured, processed, prepared, packaged, transported, stored, sold, imported, exported, presented as a gift or publicly displayed.
Yeh’s sentence was based on this article and on the fraud regulations in the Criminal Code.
However, in the case against Wei — who served as vice chairman of the National Business and Industrial Leaders’ Support Group for former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) — the court raised the prosecutors’ burden of proof by demanding evidence that the oil “could be suspected to have a negative effect on physical health,” a requirement with no legal basis.
Although the two cases were similar, the court came to the conclusion that Wei was not guilty.
In Chang Guann’s case, the court ruled that Yeh’s actions violated fraud regulations in Article 339-4 of the Criminal Code and articles 15 and 49 of the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation.
However, in Ting Hsin’s case, the court ruled that the prosecutor had not provided substantive evidence showing that the Vietnamese company Dai Hanh Phuc Co had bought and used oil from individual contractors that was made from uninspected pigs that had died from disease, which was then imported by Ting Hsin.
Therefore, Wei and others who stood accused of having violated Article 49 of the food safety act by selling adulterated or counterfeited products were not guilty.
Yeh and Wei were both charged with mixing inferior oil into their products, yet Wei was set free, while Yeh was sentenced to 22 years in prison.
Yeh is probably not the only one to question whether the scales of justice lean toward the rich and powerful.
Huang Di-ying is a lawyer.
Translated by Perry Svensson
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Thursday last week met with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at an APEC summit in Thailand. The meeting made front-page news in Japan the following day. Three years ago, when then-Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe visited Beijing to meet with Xi, no one questioned Abe’s attitude toward China, as the conservative parties in Japan had been spearheaded by Abe. However, Kishida could easily be labeled as pro-China, as he hails from Hiroshima — a place known for its anti-war, anti-nuclear movements — and was once the director of the Japan-China Friendship Association of Hiroshima.
It is quite the irony when former British prime minister Boris Johnson — a buffoon who for far too long was taken seriously — is branded a buffoon for saying something deadly serious. Following Johnson’s withering criticism of China at a business forum in Singapore on Wednesday last week, the event’s organizer, Michael Bloomberg, apologized to attendees, saying that Johnson was “trying to be amusing rather than informative and serious.” However, Johnson’s characterization of China as a “coercive autocracy” that had showed “a candid disregard for the rule of international law” was spot-on. His comments evoked the wisdom of the Austrian-British philosopher
Although internal Chinese politics are largely defined by meticulously concocted mysteries, it is an open secret that the battle for who will ascend to the highest echelons of Zhongnanhai is decided at the Beidaihe resort. It is where factions within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) engage in horse-trading over leadership selection and delegate appointments long before the party’s national congress. What unfolded at last month’s 20th National Congress was predetermined at the Beidaihe gathering in August. In this context, the CCP, and particularly Chinese President and CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping (習近平), used the event to project power and party unity.
As campaign fever for tomorrow’s local elections turns white hot, supporters of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) have been going head to head on social media. The latest row was triggered by a Facebook post on Nov. 13 by songwriter and KMT supporter Liu Chia-chang (劉家昌), who rebuked United Microelectronics Corp founder Robert Tsao (曹興誠) for advocating independence. “Although you regained your ROC [Republic of China] citizenship after returning from Singapore, you continue to help the green independents by guarding their flank,” Liu wrote, adding that it was an “insult to the nation.” “When [KMT
RSS