The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday said that it would hold a film production company accountable for using footage of a Swiss mountain instead of Yushan (玉山) in a promotional video marking Double Ten National Day.
The ministry last month uploaded the video, titled 2021: Taiwan Bringing People Together (2021，台灣有你), on YouTube. It opened with aerial footage of a mountain labeled “Mt Jade Main Peak.”
However, the footage instead showed Schafler peak in Switzerland, the ministry said in an apology on Sunday.
Photo copied by Lu Yi-hsuan, Taipei Times
Alaya Film Ltd (阿賴耶電影公司), which produced the promotional video, also issued an apology the same day.
Unsatisfied with the apologies, lawmakers and commentators asked how the company, established only three years ago, could repeatedly win ministry tenders, including for a video about the ministry’s Twin Oaks estate in the US.
Ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou (歐江安) yesterday told a news conference in Taipei that the ministry would hold Alaya Film accountable for the mistake, based on its contract.
It is the first time the company was commissioned by the ministry to produce a video marking Double Ten National Day, Ou said, rejecting claims that it was repeatedly commissioned to make similar videos.
While Broadcasting Corp of China chairman Jaw Shaw-kong (趙少康) on Monday wrote on Facebook that Ou was one of the video’s reviewers, Ou yesterday said she had taken a leave of absence from a review meeting.
Three firms had competed for the tender to make the video and the ministry chose Alaya Film based on its expertise and proposal, Ou said.
The bidding procedure was transparent and conducted in accordance with the Government Procurement Act (政府採購法), she added.
The ministry would reflect on the mistake and improve its quality control of videos, she said.
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