The Panchiao District Prosecutors' office yesterday indicted independent lawmaker Wu Tse-yuan (
Wu allegedly received NT$30 million in kickbacks for the project while head of the Taiwan Provincial Planning and Developing Department.
Prosecutors recommended the court sentence Wu to 15 years in jail for the crime and revoke his citizen's rights for seven years. Three other officials in the department were also indicted, with prosecutors requesting sentences from eight to 15 years.
Between 1987 and 1992 Wu and other officials paid a contractor involved in the plant's construction over NT$62 million in design fees even though the company failed to complete its assigned work, prosecutors said.
The indictment also says that Wu and his cohorts manipulated the criteria for contractors awarding the project to selected companies. Wu also inflated the budget of the project from NT$ 2.4 billion to NT$5.138 billion.
The company which conspired with Wu was awarded the contract for NT$4.343 billion and Wu illegally paid the company 30 percent of that total immediately after the contract was signed, the indictment says.
Wu was unable to be reached for comment yesterday.
Wu is currently in the process of appealing a 15-year conviction in another cash-for-favors scandal, in which he was found to have had accepted more than NT$6 million in kickbacks from a company which bid for a pumping station project in 1992.
Wu, who was detained after a trial by the Panchiao District Court in 1996, was granted bail for medical reasons by the High Court in May 1998.
Seven months after his release, the former KMT politician was elected to the legislature -- despite his membership having been revoked by the party, which disapproved of his campaign.
As an enormously powerful politician in the southern county of Pingtung, Wu received widespread attention due to his involvement in the case. Previous court rulings have swung wildly between his favor and that of the prosecutors.
He was previously sentenced to life in prison by the Panchiao District Court, but the sentence was reversed later in higher courts, which then invoked doubts over the impartiality of the court.
Apart from his sentence, Wu's medical parole has also been attacked in light of his run for the legislature. Some critics have called for the lawmaker to be put back in detention.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
Taiwan was ranked the fourth-safest country in the world with a score of 82.9, trailing only Andorra, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in Numbeo’s Safety Index by Country report. Taiwan’s score improved by 0.1 points compared with last year’s mid-year report, which had Taiwan fourth with a score of 82.8. However, both scores were lower than in last year’s first review, when Taiwan scored 83.3, and are a long way from when Taiwan was named the second-safest country in the world in 2021, scoring 84.8. Taiwan ranked higher than Singapore in ninth with a score of 77.4 and Japan in 10th with
SECURITY RISK: If there is a conflict between China and Taiwan, ‘there would likely be significant consequences to global economic and security interests,’ it said China remains the top military and cyber threat to the US and continues to make progress on capabilities to seize Taiwan, a report by US intelligence agencies said on Tuesday. The report provides an overview of the “collective insights” of top US intelligence agencies about the security threats to the US posed by foreign nations and criminal organizations. In its Annual Threat Assessment, the agencies divided threats facing the US into two broad categories, “nonstate transnational criminals and terrorists” and “major state actors,” with China, Russia, Iran and North Korea named. Of those countries, “China presents the most comprehensive and robust military threat
RSS