President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) will testify before court if he is summoned for questioning over allegations that he received illicit political donations, Presidential Office spokesman Charles Chen (陳以信) said yesterday.
Ma has repeatedly denied the allegations and said he is confident of withstanding even the closest scrutiny, Chen said.
“People are obliged to take the stand, if necessary, and of course President Ma would cooperate with the investigation,” he said.
Photo: Chien Jung-feng, Taipei Times
Supreme Court Prosecutors’ Office Prosecutor-General Yen Da-ho (顏大和) on Wednesday said the need to question Ma would be contingent on what prosecutors discover during their investigation.
The Special Investigation Division (SID) in December last year began to investigate allegations by radio host Clara Chou (周玉蔻) that Ma accepted an off-the-book donation of NT$200 million (US$6.3 million) from Ting Hsin International Group (頂新國際) during his re-election campaign in 2012 and separate allegations by political commentator Chen Min-feng (陳敏鳳) that at least 12 telecommunications and electronics magnates clandestinely donated a total of NT$200 million to Ma in 2007.
Pundits and opposition politicians accused Ma of being a “guardian angel” for Ting Hsin when the company was under fire following food scandals last year, because he had received large political donations from it.
“It’s not a problem of the possibility [of Ma being questioned] being excluded or not,” Yen said, in response to media inquiries, after Presidential Office Director Kang Bing-cheng (康炳政), Taiwan Lottery Co (台灣彩券) chairman Hsueh Hsiang-chuan (薛香川), Helm Technology (翰門企業) chairman Ni Chi-hsi (倪集熙) and former New Micropore (新長豐) chairman Wang Kung-chan (王公展) were questioned by the SID.
All four were released after questioning on Wednesday.
Political commentator Yao Li-ming (姚立明) alleged that illicit donations offered to Ma at a dinner in 2007 were handed to Kang. Yao described Kang, who he said has worked for Ma since 1984, as “a treasurer for Ma” and the president’s close confidant.
Several people have been questioned over the allegations, including Taiwan Memory Co (台灣記憶體公司) chairman John Hsuan (宣明智), senior Ting Hsin executive Wei Ying-chun (魏應充), Siliconware Precision Industries (矽品精密) chairman Bough Lin (林文伯), former People First Party legislator Liu Wen-hsiung (劉文雄), then-First International Telecom Corp (大眾電信) president Charlie Wu (吳清源) and former Chinese National Party (KMT) Taipei mayoral candidate Sean Lien (連勝文).
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