Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers yesterday filed corruption charges against former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), accusing him of using his political influence in a 2005 property development for financial gain.
DPP legislators Tsai Yi-yu (蔡易餘) and Wang Ting-yu (王定宇) called on the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office to investigate the allegations and demanded that travel restrictions be imposed on Ma to prevent him leaving the nation during the course of investigation.
Tsai and Wang said that in 2005, then-Taipei mayor and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Ma approved the construction of the KMT’s National Research Institute (國家發展研究院) on 8.8 hectares of land in Taipei’s Mucha District (木柵).
Ma allegedly sold the land at below market value to Yuan Lih Group for NT$430 million (US$13.66 million), which also reaped financial benefits for the KMT, because the party illegally acquired the land, forcing the original landowners from the premises, Tsai said.
Tsai also said that Ma in 2008 used his influence to secure a rezoning permit for commercial development, boosting the plot’s market value.
Yeh Sung-jen (葉頌仁), son of the original landowner, accompanied the lawmakers as they filed the charges.
Accusing former KMT authorities of acquiring the land by illegal means, Yeh said that KMT officials accompanied by four armed officers from the party’s security agency in 1962 came to their house and forced his father to sign a contract to sell the land to the party at NT$5 per ping (3.3m2) as they pointed their guns at his father’s head.
Prosecutors from the Special Investigation Division did not summon Ma or the owner of Yuan Lih for questioning during a 2007 probe.
“It was hindered from the start. The Special Investigation Division dropped the case in 2014 without prosecution,” Yeh said. “We urge prosecutors to investigate and restore justice to society.”
“After the rezoning, Yuan Lih Group gained more than NT$10 billion in profits from an increase in land value. We suspect that Ma, as the KMT chairman who sold the land, used his political influence as Taipei City mayor and also profited himself and the party through this transaction,” Wang said.
The lawmakers, along with Yeh, said they have new evidence and documents and demand that Taipei prosecutors reopen the case to determine if Ma received kickbacks from the transaction.
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