Yunlin County Council Speaker Huang Kai (黃凱) was detained and held incommunicado yesterday on suspicion of accepting a bribe in exchange for helping a company get a license for its solar power plant.
Huang was ordered detained by the New Taipei District Court based on a request by New Taipei City prosecutors after they provided evidence alleging Huang took bribes from Kuo Jin Energy Co (國金能源), the New Taipei City District Prosecutors Office said.
The judge granted the motion after concluding that Huang could potentially tamper with evidence.
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
On Thursday, New Taipei City prosecutor Chou Yi-Jun (周懿君) led officials from the Investigation Bureau’s New Taipei City office on a raid of 40 locations across western Taiwan from Tainan to Taipei and seized NT$2.32 million (US$71,533) in cash and several items, including two SUVs, and five name-brand watches.
It was estimated that the entire case allegedly involved more than NT$10 million in bribes.
On the same day as the raids, Huang and 21 others, including Yunlin County Government workers and those from the green energy industry including a man surnamed Lien (連), were brought in for questioning.
Prosecutors suspect that Huang violated the Anti-Corruption Act (貪污治罪條例) by accepting bribes and engaging in money laundering, offenses carrying a jail sentence of at least five years, prompting the request to hold him incommunicado.
According to an investigation by prosecutors, Huang allegedly accepted bribes from Lien and facilitated the issuance of an operating license for his company’s solar photovoltaic power plant located in Taihsi Township, Yunlin County.
Prosecutors said Lee Chun-hsing (李俊興), head of the Yunlin County government’s Economic Affairs Department, allegedly leaked internal county reviews of other applications to set up green power plants to Huang, who allegedly set up a shell company to accept the bribes.
If found guilty, Huang would follow in the footsteps of his predecessor Shen Tsung-lung (沈宗隆) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT).
The former Yunlin County Council speaker resigned from the post in October 2023 after pleading guilty to accepting bribes from a wind power company during an earlier investigation that year.
Huang assumed his post following a by-election.
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