Nantou County prosecutors yesterday indicted Nantou County Commissioner Lee Chao-ching (李朝卿), a member of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), on corruption and other charges, saying Lee is suspected of involvement in as many as 117 bribery cases.
The Nantou District Prosecutors’ Office said Lee was suspected of receiving kickbacks from almost every bid for a county government project since coming to office in 2008.
Lee, who has been detained since Nov. 30 last year, is alleged to have received kickbacks of between 10 percent and 15 percent of project fees from contractors. Prosecutors say Lee took more than NT$31.7 million (US$1.06 million) in bribes, and part of the money was distributed to county government officials.
Photo: Hsieh Chieh-yu, Taipei Times
Prosecutors said Lee received dirty money in a total of 117 cases, and added that he was charged with corruption and violation of the Government Procurement Act (政府採購法).
Prosecutors said Lee denied that he was corrupt, arguing that his subordinates had been in charge of the deals and that he did not know anything about them.
Prosecutors suspect that Lee and other county government officials received kickbacks from contractors who had won bids for public projects such as construction, tourism or agriculture and on projects to repair roads damaged by typhoons and floods. The actions of Lee and his government have seriously damaged the county and its people, prosecutors said.
Sixteen other people were indicted alongside Lee yesterday, including Nantou County Government Public Works Department director Huang Jung-te (黃榮德), Lee’s secretary Chang Chih-yi (張誌誼), Lee’s brother-in-law Chien Jui-chi (簡瑞祺) and contractor Wu Chung-chi (吳仲琪).
Prosecutors said they suspect the county government had divided public projects into smaller ones, each with a budget of NT$1 million, so that it could assign contractors without inviting public tenders as required by the Government Procurement Act.
Prosecutors said suspicions had grown that Chien was acting as a broker between Lee and the contractors.
The district court decided to release Lee on bail of NT$20 million, while Chien was released on NT$10 million. Both have been barred from leaving the country.
On Nov. 29 last year, prosecutors searched Lee’s office and several other locations and seized NT$300,000 in cash found in tea cans in Lee’s office and more than NT$1 million in cash from Huang’s house.
SEPARATE: The MAC rebutted Beijing’s claim that Taiwan is China’s province, asserting that UN Resolution 2758 neither mentions Taiwan nor grants the PRC authority over it The “status quo” of democratic Taiwan and autocratic China not belonging to each other has long been recognized by the international community, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday in its rebuttal of Beijing’s claim that Taiwan can only be represented in the UN as “Taiwan, Province of China.” Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) yesterday at a news conference of the third session at the 14th National People’s Congress said that Taiwan can only be referred to as “Taiwan, Province of China” at the UN. Taiwan is an inseparable part of Chinese territory, which is not only history but
CROSSED A LINE: While entertainers working in China have made pro-China statements before, this time it seriously affected the nation’s security and interests, a source said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) late on Saturday night condemned the comments of Taiwanese entertainers who reposted Chinese statements denigrating Taiwan’s sovereignty. The nation’s cross-strait affairs authority issued the statement after several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑), Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜) and Michelle Chen (陳妍希), on Friday and Saturday shared on their respective Sina Weibo (微博) accounts a post by state broadcaster China Central Television. The post showed an image of a map of Taiwan along with the five stars of the Chinese flag, and the message: “Taiwan is never a country. It never was and never will be.” The post followed remarks
NATIONAL SECURITY: The Chinese influencer shared multiple videos on social media in which she claimed Taiwan is a part of China and supported its annexation Freedom of speech does not allow comments by Chinese residents in Taiwan that compromise national security or social stability, the nation’s top officials said yesterday, after the National Immigration Agency (NIA) revoked the residency permit of a Chinese influencer who published videos advocating China annexing Taiwan by force. Taiwan welcomes all foreigners to settle here and make families so long as they “love the land and people of Taiwan,” Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) told lawmakers during a plenary session at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei. The public power of the government must be asserted when necessary and the Ministry of
Proposed amendments would forbid the use of all personal electronic devices during school hours in high schools and below, starting from the next school year in August, the Ministry of Education said on Monday. The Regulations on the Use of Mobile Devices at Educational Facilities up to High Schools (高級中等以下學校校園行動載具使用原則) state that mobile devices — defined as mobile phones, laptops, tablets, smartwatches or other wearables — should be turned off at school. The changes would stipulate that use of such devices during class is forbidden, and the devices should be handed to a teacher or the school for safekeeping. The amendments also say
RSS