Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers yesterday accused members of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) of directing KMT-led media to run online campaigns to discredit the government.
A DPP investigation has found that KMT officials hold executive or board-level roles at Olorin Media (歐絡因創意) and Fangho Media (方和傳媒), DPP spokeswoman Michelle Lin (林楚茵) told a news conference at party headquarters in Taipei, accusing the media of disseminating content maligning the government’s egg import policy and agriculture programs.
Both companies promoted the KMT in their past election campaigns and they are connected to Lin Yu-hong (林裕紘) and Hsu Che-pin (許哲賓), principal figures in the “Lin Bay Hao You” (Lin Bay 好油) incident, Lin said.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
Public prosecutors are investigating the case, after Lin Yu-hong shared posts alleging people complained of rotten eggs and he had received death threats, which he later admitted to asking Hsu, who worked for the KMT policy committee, to fabricate.
DPP Legislator Tsai Yi-yu (蔡易餘) said that Lin Hong-yu has worked with KMT Yunlin County Commissioner Chang Li-shan (張麗善) for many years and her family had control over the county government along with most of agriculture product distribution and retailing channels of central and southern Taiwan.
Hsu previously worked as the Yunlin County Goverment’s social media editor, under then-department of information head Chou Po-yin (周柏吟), a former Fangho Media chairman, Michelle Lin said.
She also presented a document and said that Hsu had taken contract work with Olorin Media, a company founded by younger party members and second-generation KMT officials, along with a list of KMT-related executives and board members.
As “Lin Bay Hao You” incident suspects were detained, Olorin Media shut down its Web site, closed its Taipei office’s doors and rejected media inquiries, Nantou County Councilor Tsai Ming-hsuan (蔡銘軒) said.
KMT officials said Hsu was let go and the public should wait for the judicial investigation’s outcome, while adding that the two companies are commercial entities and the party does not have direct control over them.
KMT Policy Committee Head William Tseng (曾銘宗) has offered an apology to the public, but said he was not aware of case details and he had no right to ask individual staff members about their involvement in other activities.
Foreign tourists who purchase a seven-day Taiwan Pass are to get a second one free of charge as part of a government bid to boost tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. A pair of Taiwan Passes is priced at NT$5,000 (US$156.44), an agency staff member said, adding that the passes can be used separately. The pass can be used in many of Taiwan’s major cities and to travel to several tourist resorts. It expires seven days after it is first used. The pass is a three-in-one package covering the high-speed rail system, mass rapid transport (MRT) services and the Taiwan Tourist Shuttle services,
Drinking a lot of water or milk would not help a person who has ingested terbufos, a toxic chemical that has been identified as the likely cause of three deaths, a health expert said yesterday. An 83-year-old woman surnamed Tseng (曾) and two others died this week after eating millet dumplings with snails that Tseng had made. Tseng died on Tuesday and others ate the leftovers when they went to her home to mourn her death that evening. Twelve people became ill after eating the dumplings following Tseng’s death. Their symptoms included vomiting and convulsions. Six were hospitalized, with two of them
DIVA-READY: The city’s deadline for the repairs is one day before pop star Jody Chiang is to perform at the Taipei Dome for the city’s Double Ten National Day celebrations The Taipei City Government has asked Farglory Group (遠雄集團) to repair serious water leaks in the Taipei Dome before Friday next week, Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) said yesterday, following complaints that many areas at the stadium were leaking during two baseball games over the weekend. The dome on Saturday and Sunday hosted two games in tribute to CTBC Brothers’ star Chou Szu-chi (周思齊) ahead of his retirement from the CPBL. The games each attracted about 40,000 people, filling the stadium to capacity. However, amid heavy rain, many people reported water leaking on some seats, at the entrance and exit areas, and the
BIG collection: The herbarium holds more than 560,000 specimens, from the Japanese colonial period to the present, including the Wulai azalea, which is now extinct in the wild The largest collection of plant specimens in Taiwan, the Taipei Botanical Garden’s herbarium, is celebrating its 100th anniversary with an exhibition that opened on Friday. The herbarium provides critical historical documents for botanists and is the first of its kind in Taiwan, Taiwan Forestry Research Institute director Tseng Yen-hsueh (曾彥學) said. It is housed in a two-story red brick building, which opened during 1924. At the time, it stored 30,000 plant specimens from almost 6,000 species, including Taiwanese plant samples collected by Tomitaro Makino, the “father of Japanese botany,” Tseng said. The herbarium collection has grown in the century since its