National Taiwan University (NTU) yesterday reiterated in a six-page report that its presidential election last year was in line with school regulations, adding that while a number of things were handled “unideally,” they resulted from poorly written regulations.
Before posting the report on its Web site yesterday, the university on Monday evening sent a hardcopy to the Ministry of Education, just in time for the deadline set by former minister Yeh Jiunn-rong (葉俊榮) on Dec. 24 last year, when he announced that then-president-elect Kuan Chung-ming (管中閔) was approved as NTU president.
The ministry had instructed the university to summarize in the report ways to improve on flaws found in the election process, including Kuan’s failure to disclose his position as an independent director at Taiwan Mobile and the election committee’s inability to prevent an alleged conflict of interest between Kuan and Richard Tsai (蔡明興), a committee member and Taiwan Mobile’s vice president.
Photo: Lin Hsiao-yun, Taipei Times
The two issues, among others, had initially cast doubt on Kuan’s eligibility and prevented him from being appointed as president on Feb. 1, as originally planned.
In the report, the university insists that the election was in line with regulations, adding that issues regarding the disclosure of information and a conflict of interest were “handled unideally because of the lack of clear regulations.”
The university said that its regulations do not require committee members to recuse themselves from elections unless they are the spouse or a first-to-third-degree relative of a candidate, or they have been the thesis advisor or a thesis student of the candidate.
In the future, the university would advise an election committee to include a blank space on candidates’ recommendation forms so that information they are required by law to disclose can be included, the school said.
It would also advice the committee to re-examine circumstances that might require a recusal, creating a checklist for committee members and candidates to sign off on before an election, it said.
To encourage teachers to get university approval before taking outside jobs, the school has increased what teachers without prior approval must share with the university about outside work.
However, the school urged the ministry to consider relaxing rules pertaining to teachers taking outside jobs, saying that the government should encourage cooperation between schools and industry to boost the nation’s competitiveness in the global market.
The ministry plans to form a team of experts to review the report and offer recommendations, Minister of Education Pan Wen-chung (潘文忠) told reporters yesterday.
The ministry has been reviewing universities’ presidential elections as a whole, with the aim of “promoting transparency to ensure that great candidates can be elected,” he said.
NTU had not been singled out in its review, he said.
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