The Ministry of Education (MOE) yesterday said it would enforce the closure of Yung Ta Institute of Technology and Commerce if it fails to inform the ministry of its shutdown by Jan. 8.
Former school employees yesterday protested outside the Executive Yuan and the ministry, accusing the ministry of failing in its duties and calling for the school to compensate them for salary owed, severance payments and civil servant insurance payouts.
The ministry received court approval to disband the school’s board of directors on Aug 29, after applying in March, on grounds that the school, in Pingtung County’s Linluo Township (麟洛), had breached Article 25 of the Private School Act (私立學校法) and had stopped paying its former faculty members’ monthly pensions.
Photo: Lee Hsin-fang, Taipei Times
However, the school’s board appealed the decision, leaving the case — along with obligations to pay former staff and faculty — hanging in the air.
Department of Technological and Vocational Education official Eric Ker (柯今尉) yesterday said that he had accepted a petition from the protesters.
The ministry said it would uphold the rights of former faculty and staff in the event of forced closure.
The school faced financial difficulties in 2013 and in the next year it applied to the ministry, and failed to obtain, approval to downsize.
In August 2014, the institute said it could not sustain employees and faculty without income from student enrollments, as the ministry had imposed a no-enrollment order on the university and declared that it was shutting down.
However, it said that it was considering transitioning into a junior college.
Global bodies should stop excluding Taiwan for political reasons, President William Lai (賴清德) told Pope Francis in a letter, adding that he agrees war has no winners. The Vatican is one of only 12 countries to retain formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan, and Taipei has watched with concern efforts by Beijing and the Holy See to improve ties. In October, the Vatican and China extended an accord on the appointment of Catholic bishops in China for four years, pointing to a new level of trust between the two parties. Lai, writing to the pope in response to the pontiff’s message on Jan. 1’s
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