Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) today defended his purchase of office space near the Legislative Yuan, saying he followed conventional practice in using election subsidies to set up a personal office for long-term use.
Earlier in the morning, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City Councilor Lin Yen-feng (林延鳳) said that Ko on May 10 purchased 48.76 ping (161.2m²) of office space in Taipei’s Jinan Building (濟南大樓), spending NT$43 million (US$1.35 million) in cash and signing under his name.
Lin questioned where Ko got the money from, as the former presidential candidate and his TPP have been under scrutiny in recent weeks over irregular campaign finance reporting and unusually high spending.
Photo: Ho Yu-hua, Taipei Times
Speaking to reporters at TPP headquarters, Ko said that he followed the example of other political parties in allocating one-third of election subsidy funds to the party headquarters and two-thirds to the candidate.
Ko said he used the two-thirds allocated to him to set up a personal office, which he plans to use long-term.
Vicky Chen (陳智菡), who served as Ko’s deputy campaign chief, said there are two kinds of party election accounts: one for political donations, and another for subsidies allocated to an individual candidate.
Ko gave most of his candidate subsidy to the party and used the rest to purchase the office, she said, adding that former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) also had a personal office when serving as DPP chairperson.
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