Politicians across party lines yesterday called on Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taoyuan mayoral candidate Simon Chang (張善政) to address allegations of plagiarism in a research project he headed while working at Acer Inc.
Chang allegedly plagiarized materials from various published articles, online sites and journals when he led a team undertaking a research project with a NT$57.36 million (US$1.88 million at the current exchange rate) grant from the Council of Agriculture (COA) from 2007 to 2009, according to news reports and information provided by lawmakers.
The report submitted to the council was a hodge-podge mix of plagiarized material, with many copied verbatim from other sources without providing citations, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lo Chih-cheng (羅致政) said.
Photo: CNA
“It is shameful that Chang has not provided an explanation. When asked about it, his only answer was: ‘You should go ask Acer.’ He refuses to admit having committed plagiarism and has instead pushed Acer in front as a shield for him to hide behind,” Lo said.
DPP lawmakers showed a list that includes 16 sources that Chang and his team had allegedly plagiarized, including online and published academic journals in Taiwan, China, the Netherlands and Hong Kong, Business Weekly magazine, news releases by the COA and other government agencies, and a master’s thesis from a southern Taiwan university.
“Chang’s transgression was more than just plagiarism,” DPP Legislator Wang Ting-yu (王定宇) said. “He used this plagiarized report to secure NT$57.36 million from the government.”
“Let me remind you what Chang said about the plagiarism allegations against former Hsinchu mayor Lin Chih-chien (林智堅),” Wang said.
Lin was the DPP’s candidate for Taoyuan mayor, but quit the race amid allegations that he had plagiarized his master’s theses at two universities.
“Chang said at the time: ‘A person who has lost their integrity should drop out of the race.’ However, Chang seems to have forgotten” what he said, Wang said.
“We have also seen how KMT, pro-KMT media outlets, and blue-camp politicians and academics went all out in attacking Lin,” and how Chang is “so tolerant and forgiving of his own violations,” he added.
Chang’s lawyer and campaign officials filed a judicial complaint at the Taoyuan District Prosecutors’ Office calling for an investigation into breaches of election laws, and accusing DPP Taoyuan mayoral candidate Cheng Yun-peng (鄭運鵬) and several DPP members of defamation.
Separately, Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Taoyuan mayoral candidate Lai Hsiang-ling (賴香伶) said that “Chang was the project’s principal investigator, so he has the responsibility to explain the plagiarism allegations, and how the funds were spent on this project... He has not done so, and Taoyuan residents have doubts about trusting him to head the city government.”
Meanwhile, New Power Party Legislator Chiu Hsiang-chih (邱顯智) said that Chang’s campaign team is a “criminal ring” (犯罪集團), as more than half of them — seven out of the 13 appointed heads of Taoyuan electorate constituencies — had run afoul of the law in the past.
“Members of Chang’s team were convicted and sentenced to jail, or found guilty, but placed on probation or given suspended sentences. More than half of them were convicted of vote-buying, intimidation, threatening violence, tax evasion and other criminal offenses,” Chiu said.
This shows the return of “black gold” politics — the KMT’s links to gangsters and corrupt politicians, he added.
Voters must keep in mind that if Chang gets elected, these people would be taking key roles in city administration, he said.
South Korean K-pop girl group Blackpink are to make Kaohsiung the first stop on their Asia tour when they perform at Kaohsiung National Stadium on Oct. 18 and 19, the event organizer said yesterday. The upcoming performances will also make Blackpink the first girl group ever to perform twice at the stadium. It will be the group’s third visit to Taiwan to stage a concert. The last time Blackpink held a concert in the city was in March 2023. Their first concert in Taiwan was on March 3, 2019, at NTSU Arena (Linkou Arena). The group’s 2022-2023 “Born Pink” tour set a
CPBL players, cheerleaders and officials pose at a news conference in Taipei yesterday announcing the upcoming All-Star Game. This year’s CPBL All-Star Weekend is to be held at the Taipei Dome on July 19 and 20.
The Taiwan High Court yesterday upheld a lower court’s decision that ruled in favor of former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) regarding the legitimacy of her doctoral degree. The issue surrounding Tsai’s academic credentials was raised by former political talk show host Dennis Peng (彭文正) in a Facebook post in June 2019, when Tsai was seeking re-election. Peng has repeatedly accused Tsai of never completing her doctoral dissertation to get a doctoral degree in law from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in 1984. He subsequently filed a declaratory action charging that
The Hualien Branch of the High Court today sentenced the main suspect in the 2021 fatal derailment of the Taroko Express to 12 years and six months in jail in the second trial of the suspect for his role in Taiwan’s deadliest train crash. Lee Yi-hsiang (李義祥), the driver of a crane truck that fell onto the tracks and which the the Taiwan Railways Administration's (TRA) train crashed into in an accident that killed 49 people and injured 200, was sentenced to seven years and 10 months in the first trial by the Hualien District Court in 2022. Hoa Van Hao, a
RSS