Lawmakers at the legislature’s Transportation Committee yesterday censured the Ministry of Transportation and Communications for the delayed launch of the Airport Rail connecting Taipei and Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport.
Because of the delay in one of the nation’s most important public construction projects, the committee also rejected a proposal from the ministry to unfreeze the budget for Taoyuan International Airport Corp, the Directorate-General of Highways and other agencies, and ruled that the matter will be reviewed at another time.
The ministry originally planned to open the Airport Rail section between Sanchong (三重) and Jhongli (中壢) in October this year. However, it announced on Wednesday that operations in this section would not be launched until the end of 2015 due to lengthy disputes between signaling system contractor Marubeni Corp and its subcontractor, which had only been resolved two months ago.
Former Bureau of High Speed Rail director-general Chu Shu (朱旭) resigned on Wednesday after assuming responsibility for the delay.
Minister of Transportation and Communications Yeh Kuang-shih (葉匡時) was the target of criticism in yesterday’s question-and-answer session.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Kun-tse (李昆澤) said the contractor already knew that the government, under the circumstances, cannot do anything about the Airport Rail’s delayed launch. Since the public has been complaining about the ministry’s ability to execute the nation’s public construction projects, Lee said that Yeh should also consider stepping down and assuming responsibility for the delay.
DPP Legislator Yeh Yi-jin (葉宜津) accused the minister of hiding the Airport Rail construction situation from the public, adding that the minister should apologize to the committee as well as to the public. She also asked the ministry to start fining Marubeni and seek compensation for any financial losses accrued because of the Airport Rail’s delayed launch.
Yeh Kuang-shih emphasized that he had questioned why Marubeni, who only had experience in building railway tracks, could secure the contract for the Airport Rail’s signaling system. He said he had also questioned why the government decided to choose the lowest tender rather than the most advantageous tender in the bid for such a big contract.
Even though prosecutors had investigated controversies over the bidding for the signaling system, the case was closed as the investigators could not find anything illegal, he added.
In the meantime, Deputy Minister of Transportation and Communications Jack Hsu (許俊逸) has been assigned to oversee the operation of the Bureau of High Speed Rail, he said.
“We will thoroughly investigate the case, including how the bidding was designed from the start,” Yeh Kuang-shih said.
“We will then submit all the information to the prosecutors for further investigation. We will not tolerate any illegality in this matter,” he added.
He said that he aims to amend the system regulating the quality of the nation’s public construction projects during his term as minister to avoid similar mistakes in the future.
He said he is confident that the Airport Rail would be launched by the revised deadline, adding that the ministry would start planning the shuttle bus routes leading to the Airport Rail stations during this period of time.
Separately yesterday, Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) said during the weekly Cabinet meeting that the delay in the launch of the Airport Rail has hampered the development of the country, and eroded public confidence and trust in the government.
Each and every government agency has to draw a lesson from this case and do its best to avoid making the same mistake — one that would have a negative impact on people’s lives and damage the government’s image, Jiang said.
Jiang suggested that Cabinet members establish a task force to supervise the status of major construction projects being undertaken by their subordinate agencies every two months, as he has done when he was minister of the interior.
All government agencies should set their construction plans in motion with the aim of completing projects earlier and stimulating economic growth, he said.
Additional reporting by Shih Hsiu-chuan
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
CHANGING LANDSCAPE: Many of the part-time programs for educators were no longer needed, as many teachers obtain a graduate degree before joining the workforce, experts said Taiwanese universities this year canceled 86 programs, Ministry of Education data showed, with educators attributing the closures to the nation’s low birthrate as well as shifting trends. Fifty-three of the shuttered programs were part-time postgraduate degree programs, about 62 percent of the total, the most in the past five years, the data showed. National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) discontinued the most part-time master’s programs, at 16: chemistry, life science, earth science, physics, fine arts, music, special education, health promotion and health education, educational psychology and counseling, education, design, Chinese as a second language, library and information sciences, mechatronics engineering, history, physical education
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
RSS