Pingtung County prosecutors yesterday detained two people after questioning five earlier this week in connection with allegations of vote-buying against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Aboriginal Legislator Chien Tung-ming (簡東明).
Pingtung’s move came one day after four suspected vote-brokers allegedly working for Chien were held incommunicado following a probe by the Taichung District Prosecutors’ Office.
Pingtung prosecutor Yang Wan-li (楊婉莉) said that the county district prosecutors’ office launched an investigation after receiving reports of people paying cash in exchange for votes during the campaign for Aboriginal legislative candidates in several constituencies.
Yang said the office conducted coordinated raids with representatives from Criminal Investigation Bureau units and local police stations on Friday last week, the day before the elections, searching more than a dozen places and residences in Sandimen (三地門) and Majia (瑪家) townships. Situated in the hills and mountain areas of Pingtung, the two townships are mainly inhabited by Paiwan Aborgines.
Armed with warrants, officials detained 30 people for questioning in the operation last Friday. Five more people were summoned for questioning on Wednesday.
Two of the suspects, surnamed Wang (王) and Ma (馬), were held incommunicado yesterday morning, after investigators found cash and lists of eligible voters in their possession, Yang said.
Several residents have reportedly admitted accepting cash in exchange for votes, with Wang and Ma allegedly acting as vote-brokers for Chien, prosecutors said.
Chien, also known as Uliw Qaljupayare, is from Pingtung’s Paiwan Community, and had served as Shihzih Township (獅子) head.
He first won an Aboriginal legislative seat for the KMT in 2008, but was embroiled in litigation on vote-buying charges.
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