Former minister of education Wu Maw-kuen (吳茂昆) was yesterday impeached by the Control Yuan for contravening the Public Functionary Service Act (公務員服務法) and Act on the Recusal of Public Servants Due to Conflict of Interest (公職人員利益衝突迴避法) after he was found to have applied for patents for a technology owned by National Dong Hwa University in the name of his company.
The Control Yuan in April launched an investigation into Wu’s involvement with a company called Spiranthes Biotech LLC, which he founded in California in 2015, after Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ko Chih-en (柯志恩) accused him of illegally founding the company and applying for patents for technology he invented with a research team at the university.
Members on the Control Yuan’ examination committee unanimously voted to impeach Wu. It was the first time an examination committee at a government branch held an open vote that resulted in a unanimous decision.
Photo: CNA
Wu applied to establish the company on Aug. 18, 2015, and founded it on Sept. 2 after the state government approved his application, a Control Yuan report said.
Wu was one of the shareholders at the company, with managerial control over business operations, and participated in its patent application process, it said.
The company had a registered capital of US$1,000, with US$200 coming from Wu, which contravenes Article 13, Paragraph 1 of the Public Functionary Service Act, which bans civil servants from owning and investing in businesses, the report said.
Wu also encroached upon the university’s rights by applying for patents for its technology in the name of his company, it said.
During his term as university president, Wu approved a school budget to cover the expenses his company needed to apply for patents, the report said.
The university on March 15, 2016, wired NT$766,952 to the law firm WSGR without knowing that the patent application was to be submitted in the name of Wu’s company, it said.
This violated provisions on conflict of interest in the Public Functionary Service Act and the Act on the Recusal of Public Servants Due to Conflict of Interest, it said.
Wu yesterday denied any wrongdoing.
In April, Wu said that he had planned to return the patent rights to the university once the company obtained them in the US and China.
He also said that it is common practice for inventors to apply for patents for their inventions, then negotiate with their university on how to share the revenue.
Additional reporting by Ann Maxon
A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm early yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, less than a week after a typhoon barreled across the nation. The agency issued an advisory at 3:30am stating that the 22nd tropical storm, named Yinxing, of the Pacific typhoon season formed at 2am. As of 8am, the storm was 1,730km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, with a 100km radius. It was moving west-northwest at 32kph, with maximum sustained winds of 83kph and gusts of up to 108kph. Based on its current path, the storm is not expected to hit Taiwan, CWA
Residents have called on the Taipei City Government to reconsider its plan to demolish a four-decades-old pedestrian overpass near Daan Forest Park. The 42-year-old concrete and steel structure that serves as an elevated walkway over the intersection of Heping and Xinsheng roads is to be closed on Tuesday in preparation for demolition slated for completion by the end of the month. However, in recent days some local residents have been protesting the planned destruction of the intersection overpass that is rendered more poetically as “sky bridge” in Chinese. “This bridge carries the community’s collective memory,” said a man surnamed Chuang
FATALITIES: The storm claimed at least two lives — a female passenger in a truck that was struck by a falling tree and a man who was hit by a utility pole Workers cleared fallen trees and shop owners swept up debris yesterday after one of the biggest typhoons to hit the nation in decades claimed at least two lives. Typhoon Kong-rey was packing winds of 184kph when it slammed into eastern Taiwan on Thursday, uprooting trees, triggering floods and landslides, and knocking out power as it swept across the nation. A 56-year-old female foreign national died from her injuries after the small truck she was in was struck by a falling tree on Provincial Highway 14A early on Thursday. The second death was reported at 8pm in Taipei on Thursday after a 48-year-old man
A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm earlier today, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The 22nd tropical storm, named Yinxing, in this year's Pacific typhoon season formed at 2am, the CWA said. As of 8am, the storm was 1,730km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) with a 100km radius, it said. It was moving west-northwest at 32kph, with maximum sustained winds of 83kph and gusts of up to 108kph. Based on its current path, the storm is not expected to hit Taiwan, CWA meteorologist Huang En-hung (黃恩宏) said. However, a more accurate forecast would be made on Wednesday, when Yinxing is
RSS