Judicial investigators yesterday questioned Taipei City Councilor Pan Hwai-tzong (潘懷宗) of the New Party and New Taipei City Councilor Tseng Huan-chia (曾煥嘉) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) on allegations of embezzling public funds allocated to pay for their office assistants’ salaries.
A bail court released Pan on NT$2 million (US$70,472) bail, while his office chief, Chen Yu-tai (陳玉臺), was released after posting NT$1.5 million bail.
Tseng was detained following questioning.
Photo: CNA
Prosecutors said Pan and Tseng face corruption charges in separate cases for “withholding public funds without authorization with an intent to profit” under Article 5 of the Anti-Corruption Act (貪污治罪條例), which carries a punishment of at least seven years in prison if found guilty.
Judicial investigators backed by local police on Tuesday conducted searches in Taipei and New Taipei City, focusing on the residences and offices of Pan and Tseng, as well as those of their office assistants.
The former’s case is handled by the Taipei Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office, while that of the latter is handled by the New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office.
Investigators said Pan and Chen from 2008 to last year allegedly embezzled a total of NT$3 million in public funds allocated to subsidize office assistants’ salaries by using figurehead accounts.
Each elected councilor in the six special municipalities can hire up to eight assistants to help in policy research and provide services to constituents.
Public funds can be used to pay up to NT$80,000 per assistant per month, while in other counties and smaller cities councilors can hire up to four assistants, according to the Regulations on Allowances for Elected Representatives and Subsidies for Village Heads and Wardens (地方民意代表費用支給及村里長事務補助費補助條例).
In Tseng’s case, prosecutors on Tuesday conducted searches and summoned 21 other people in connection with the corruption probe.
A three-term city councilor, Tseng allegedly embezzled government subsidies for assistants’ salaries using falsified reports.
He allegedly embezzled an estimated NT$1 million since 2013, investigators said.
Three others also listed as suspects in the case are Tseng’s assistants surnamed Hsu (徐), Chiang (蔣) and Lin (林). They were released after posting bails of NT$50,000 and NT$100,000.
Pan is one of the three incumbent Taipei City councilors from the New Party.
Serving as city councilor since 2002, he got entangled in numerous controversies, as he appeared in political talk shows and was declared an expert in medicine and nutrition, promoting pharmaceutical products and food supplements on TV and radio, despite not having a degree in medicine or pharmacy.
Health authorities rebuked him for endorsing medical and food supplement products, and making health claims. Health associations and medical professionals have long criticized Pan’s actions.
Separately yesterday, the High Court found KMT Hsinchu County Councilor Chen Pai-wei (陳?維) guilty of embezzling about NT$1.92 million of public funds allocated for office assistants’ salaries over the past seven years.
The court upheld the three-year-and-six-month jail sentence from the first ruling, overturning the six-month sentence from the second ruling.
Additional reporting by CNA
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