Taipei City Government’s Department of Urban Planning said that Core Pacific City Co’s (京華城) redevelopment project had undergone required urban planning procedures, but whether they were legitimate should be determined by the courts, Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) said yesterday.
Chiang made the remark in response to reporters’ questions on the sidelines of a speech to the Chinese American Academic and Professional Association in New York during his visit to the US.
Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) on Thursday was detained and held incommunicado for alleged corruption in the Core Pacific City redevelopment project, which was allowed to increase its floor area ratio to 840 percent while Ko was in his second term as Taipei mayor.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
After Ko’s detention, the TPP on Friday said the city government’s urban planning department in January issued a news release stating that the redevelopment project complied with the principles of “appropriateness, public interest, fair consideration and legality.”
However, Taipei Deputy Mayor Lee Ssu-chuan (李四川) on Sunday said the document was a clarification in response to the Control Yuan’s correction on the redevelopment project.
“In principle, it explained that after we [the department] reviewed the process, we found that it met the procedures required by the Urban Planning Act (都市計畫法),” he said.
“Whether it is legal, of course, is up to the court to judge,” he said. “We did not say it is legal, only that it complied with proper procedures.”
Asked to comment on the issue, Chiang said that “the review procedure of the Core Pacific City project had complied with the Urban Planning Act’s procedures, but whether it is legitimate… We must respect the court’s decision.”
The case is in the judicial inquiry stage, so the city government respects its investigation, Chiang said.
Hopefully it would be dealt with based on the principle of “not unjustly accusing the innocent, nor showing mercy to the guilty,” he said.
If illegal conduct is found, the perpetrators must be held accountable, Chiang added.
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