Netizens are casting doubt on recent reports that students were paid to take part in a protest against the takeover by Want Want China Times Group of the cable TV channels owned by service provider China Network Systems (CNS), saying the group most likely instigated the reports to attack the protesters.
On Friday, the Chinese-language China Times, China Times Weekly and local news channel CtiTV — all members of Want Want Group — ran stories with pictures showing student protesters taking money after a rally outside the National Communications Commission (NCC) building.
Although the media outlets provided no evidence to back up their claims, the three outlets reported that Academia Sinica research fellow Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) may have been involved in paying the students.
Huang had organized a separate demonstration at the same time as the student rally in front of the NCC building because the commission was reviewing the merger at that time. However, reports from the China Times, China Times Weekly and CtiTV did not differentiate between the two demonstrations.
Although Huang organized a press conference denying that he had any connection with the student protest, the media group continued to accuse him of “not wanting to clarify the incident,” while saying he was “not willing to disclose the truth.”
Yesterday, several media outlets, including the Chinese-language Apple Daily, claimed to have discovered the identity of a woman who handed out money to students on Wednesday.
The woman, identified as Liang Li-hui (梁麗惠), is an accountant at Chinsen Communications Co.
While reporters were unable to contact her, Liang’s colleagues said that although they did not know who had hired the company to recruit students, they were certain it was not Huang.
Netizens are increasingly voicing suspicions that Want Want Group may be behind the incident and using it as a way to stigmatize opponents of the takeover.
National Tsinghua University student Chen Wei-ting (陳為廷) posted a picture of the protest that was aired in a CtiTV report, with the China Times Weekly deputy editor-in-chief Lin Chao-hsin (林朝鑫) among the crowd, adding that he suspected Want Want was behind the protest.
Lin denied the accusations, saying he was at the protest because it was his job to report on it, while CTiTV threatened to file a slander lawsuit against Chen.
Want Want China Times Media Group employees accused the media giant of manipulating news reports to attack Huang.
“I feel like dying everyday,” a reporter told the Taipei Times on condition of anonymity. “My name is on news reports attacking Huang, and I’ve seen readers criticizing me for the reports on the Internet, but the fact is that I didn’t produce most of these reports.”
The employee said that his name and the names of several of his colleagues were on the byline of a news report published on Friday implying that Huang was behind the incident.
“In fact, 90 percent of the report came directly from the China Times Weekly and what I wrote was all deleted,” the reporter said. “I complained about this several times, but the management simply ignored me.”
The reporter said many employees within the group feel uncomfortable with what the company asks them to do, with one resigning because of it.
Huang released a statement yesterday, asking Want Want China Times to “stop destroying the dignity of journalists in the group.”
“What Want Want China Times has been doing proves how important it is to resist this media monster, which has no ethics in news reporting,” the statement said.
He also called on the media group to leave his family alone, as reporters from the group have not only been following him around for days, but have also stationed themselves around his house.
Huang said he would be leaving for the US for 10 months on a pre-scheduled research project next week, but added that the project was scheduled last year, and asked the media group to refrain from fabricating so-called news out of it.
He was referring to a report by CtiTV that Huang’s decision to leave Taiwan for so long right after the alleged scandal broke was “suspicious.”
The Central Weather Bureau could issue a sea alert for Super Typhoon Mawar, as it is forecast to turn north and come closest to Taiwan from Tuesday to Wednesday next week. Mawar was downgraded from a super typhoon to a typhoon after sweeping across Guam on Wednesday night, knocking down trees and leaving much of the US territory without power. Many residents of Guam yesterday remained without power and utilities after Mawar tore through the remote US Pacific territory the previous night, ripping roofs off homes, flipping vehicles and shredding trees. There were no immediate reports of deaths and injuries, but the
ADJUSTMENTS: Over the next five years, every year except 2026 would have only one makeup workday to compensate for national holidays, the government said The Executive Yuan (EY) yesterday announced the official workday calendar for next year, which includes one makeup day and four holidays with more than three days off. It also announced new standards for makeup days in the event of consecutive holidays. The Directorate-General of Personnel Administration cited the importance of the Lunar New Year and Tomb Sweeping holidays to the public as its reason to mandate flexible off-days. The 115 total off-days dovetail with dates that international financial markets are closed, minimizing the effects of state holidays on stock and currency exchange trading, it said. Over the next five years, only the calendar for
EMBRACE CHANGE: Jensen Huang told NTU graduates that instead of worrying about AI itself, they should worry that people with expertise in AI would be taking their jobs Artificial intelligence (AI) is redefining the computer industry, and Taiwanese companies could play a major role in replacing the world’s traditional computers as they are the foundation of the industry, Nvidia Corp cofounder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said in Taipei yesterday. Huang made the remarks while giving the keynote speech at National Taiwan University’s (NTU) commencement ceremony. AI has created immense opportunities, and versatile companies can be expected to take advantage and boost their position, while less flexible firms would perish, he said. “In every way, this is a rebirth of the computer industry and a golden opportunity for the companies of
‘ARCHAIC’: An interpretation of a law that considered Chinese as Taiwanese nationals was scrapped after the death of a Chinese in Kaohsiung led to state reparations An administrative mandate to consider Chinese as Taiwanese citizens was outdated, Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) said yesterday, a day after the Executive Yuan ordered that agencies disregard the 30-year-old interpretation. Chen made the remarks at an event held by the Environmental Protection Administration in Taipei following changes to the administrative mandate concerning the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例). The previous interpretation of the law was archaic and contrary to the workings of laws and regulations, he said, adding that the order was made to avoid unnecessary problems created by the mandate. The Mainland
RSS