Thu, May 04, 2017 page3

• Teacher accused of bid rigging

  IN HIDING: A teacher accused of sexual assault allegedly promoted himself as a National Sun Yat-sen University graduate, but the school has no record of his attendance

  • By Jason Pan / Staff reporter
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  A lawmaker yesterday presented documents that he said proved a prominent cram-school teacher allegedly involved in a sex scandal had engaged in bid rigging and collusion to obtain government agency contracts totaling NT$300 million (US$9.98 million).

  The teacher, who is well-known in Taiwan’s cram school industry and has been teaching high-school students across the nation for two decades, went into hiding after he was accused by Kaohsiung City Councilor Hsiao Jung-ta (蕭永達) on Tuesday of seducing and sexually assaulting female high-school students under his charge.

  Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Chun-hsien (林俊憲) went public with documents accusing the teacher, surnamed Chen, of bid rigging and collusion.

  

  Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Lin Chun-hsien, second right, holds a news conference in Taipei yesterday accusing a cram school teacher of bid rigging and collusion.

  Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times

  “We know that some crimes, such as sexual assault, are difficult to prosecute due to the statute of limitations. However, now we have concrete evidence that Chen has used illegal means to procure public tender contracts,” Lin said.

  “Once we start the judicial process, Chen has to attend trial hearings in court, and if convicted, he would have to serve jail time,” he added.

  Chen is the main proprietor of a publishing company based in Taipei, which in the past 14 years has won numerous open tender bids in the public sector to produce promotional brochures, books and year-end reports for public agencies, including the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the Taipei City Government, the state-own CPC Corp, Taiwan, the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts and municipal governments.

  “It is a small-scale company with NT$5 million in declared assets and only 10 employees, according to its business registration record, but Chen was able to win almost every public sector tender and defeated large Taiwanese media companies with far greater operating capital, annual turnover and business resources, such as Commonwealth Magazine Group, Taiwan Television Enterprise, Business Today Co and China Times Corp,” Lin said.

  “Through our own fact-finding efforts, we found that Chen’s company had undue influence at various government agencies, helping him win the tender contract almost every time,” Lin said, adding that an official involved in the process had alleged that Chen had bribed several academics who sat on the evaluation committees for the tenders.

  Lin said Chen’s company was in breach of the Government Procurement Act (政府採購法) and other laws, and demanded that the Ministry of Justice’s Agency Against Corruption conduct a judicial investigation.

  Lin also accused Chen of fabricating his academic record.

  Promotion for Chen’s cram schools touted him as holding a Master’s from National Sun Yat-sen University, “but we checked with university officials and they said Chen had never attended any course at their school,” Lin said.

  He urged all students and parents who had paid tuition fees for courses at Chen’s schools to file a class-action lawsuit against him “so he will face justice and be punished for his crimes.”
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