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Legislator calls for
medical parole for Chen Shui-bian
By Shih Hsiu-chuan / Staff reporter
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chen Ken-te (陳根德) yesterday called
for President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to grant a pardon to jailed former president
Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) under the condition that the Democratic Progressive Party
reaches agreement with President Ma on the matter.
Chen Ken-te proposed the idea during a question-and-answer session with Premier
Sean Chen in the legislature, marking him the second pan-blue politician to
appeal for Chen Shui-bian’s medical parole.
Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) in August called on the Ma administration to
consider granting Chen Shui-bian, who is serving a 17-and-a-half-year sentence
for corruption, medical parole.
Chen Ken-te sought the premier’s views on the possibility that Taiwan emulate
the granting of pardons to the two former presidents of South Korea, Roh Tae-woo
and Chun Doo-hwan, imprisoned for corruption charges, by former South Korean
president Kim Dae-jung.
Kim Dae-jung took the initiative to meet with former South Korean president Kim
Young-Sam, who put the two corrupt former presidents in jail, and agreed to the
pardons through political negotiations, “which was why the South Korea sailed
through its economic difficulties then and created its economic achievements
today,” the lawmaker said.
Chen Ken-te said the pardons in South Korea and the pardon granted to former US
president Richard Nixon both healed political divisions within societies and
enabled the people to unite together to move their nations forward.
In response, Sean Chen said that he agreed that granting a pardon to Chen
Shui-bian would help improve the political atmosphere, adding that under the
Amnesty Act (赦免法), adding that only the president and the Ministry of Justice
have the power to make the decision to grant parole, not the premier.
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