The Taipei High Administrative Court yesterday ruled against the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in two lawsuits initiated by the Cabinet’s Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee over three entities in Taipei with a combined worth of NT$16.38 billion (US$589.19 million at the current exchange rate).
The court’s decision deemed that two investment firms — Central Investment Co (中央投資公司) and Hsinyutai Co (欣裕台), worth a combined NT$15.6 billion — and one residential building — Daxiao Building (大孝大樓), worth NT$782 million — had been obtained by the KMT through illegal means.
The court ruled that the properties were ill-gotten party assets and prohibited the KMT from disposing of or transferring them, while company shares and the value of the properties are to be transferred to the state.
The KMT’s attorney Chang Shao-teng (張少騰) said that the party would likely appeal the decision.
In 2016, the committee, which was then headed by Wellington Koo (顧立雄), issued an administrative injunction through a disposition letter that the KMT needed to transfer all shareholding rights to the government.
A committee investigation found that the KMT had used illegally obtained assets to start the KMT-affiliated investment firms.
The KMT had contravened the Act Governing the Handling of Ill-gotten Properties by Political Parties and Their Affiliate Organizations (政黨及其附隨組織不當取得財產處理條例), which had been enacted to ensure fair competition among political parties and to improve the nation’s democratic system, the committee said.
The probe found that the KMT had owned 100 percent of Central Investment since its founding in 1971 and had spun off Hsinyutai Co in 2010 with the intent of separating disputed party properties from those that could be privatized, although KMT officials continued to own and manage both companies.
“In an era when there was no distinction between the party and the state, half of the KMT’s revenue came from state subsidies, while its affiliated organizations provided about 20 percent, and it had some other sources of income,” Koo said at the time.
To block the committee’s injunction, KMT officials filed the litigation at the Taipei High Administrative Court.
The party also filed for a constitutional interpretation on the case. In August last year, the Council of Grand Justices issued Interpretation No. 793, which ruled in favor of the committee and allowed the case to proceed.
In May 2019, the committee issued an injunction that the KMT needed to transfer the value of the Daxiao Building, which is on Aikuo E Road, to the government.
An investigation found that the property had been public housing before the KMT took it over in 1985, and that the building was sold to the KMT-owned Kuanghua Investment Co (光華投資) for NT$1.3 billion in 2002, before being sold to Yuanta Group (元大集團) in 2010.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and