The alleged power struggle between two top-ranking executives at the Bank of Taiwan (
During a question-and-answer session at the legislature yesterday morning, Minister of Finance Lin Chuan (
Grace period
"If the relationship between the two does not improve, [the Ministry of Finance] may consider removing one of them from his current position," Lin said.
But he immediately stressed that the media may have overstated the bank's internal friction, adding that he would allow a grace period for the two to resolve their differences.
Lin's remark came at a time when the local media started speculating that a poor relationship and different leadership styles between Chen and Lee may have divided the nation's largest state-owned bank into two factions and resulted in its poor performance recently.
To fend off such allegations, Lee called an emergency press conference yesterday evening, denying that he was at odds with Chen as the media had reported.
"The chairman and I -- 99.9 percent of the time -- agree with each other on internal management affairs," Lee said, saying that they were were devoted to facilitate the bank's privatization plan before 2007.
Punishment?
Pressed about the likelihood of disagreement on certain issues and how would he respond in that environment, Lee said he would fully respect the chair-man's final say on the bank's management.
"Different views we may have, but bad terms we've never been on," Lee said, while chiding the media for playing up the tension between the two.
Chen didn't attend the press conference yesterday. According to Lee, Chen was at a Bankers Association meeting but had authorized Lee to chair the media gathering.
In addition, the bank's board is expected to decide whether it will issue Lee a demerit after the finance ministry held Lee responsible for mismanaging the ATM fraud last week.
Facing possible punishment, Lee said that he would "fully respect the board's final decision."
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