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Prosecutors add more charges in Chen
Shui-bian case
INAPPROPRIATE RECEIPTS: The vice chairman of Cathay
Financial Holdings Co said money he gave the former first family was a political
donation, not a bribe
By Shelley Huang
STAFF REPORTER
Wednesday, Feb 03, 2010, Page 3
Former president Chen Shui-bian’s spokesman,
Chiang Chih-ming, second right, Taiwan North Society president Janice Chen,
right, and other Chen supporters launch a campaign in Taipei yesterday to write
letters to President Ma Ying-jeou requesting that Chen be released from
detention to spend the Lunar New Year at home with his family.
PHOTO: CNA
Taipei District Prosecutors yesterday added more charges against detained former
president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), alleging the former president instructed his
former aides to lie about the reimbursement processes for the presidential
“state affairs fund.”
Prosecutors allege that in 2006, when he was still in office, Chen called a
meeting at the Presidential Office with former Presidential Office deputy
secretary-general Ma Yung-cheng (馬永成) and former Presidential Office director
Lin Teh-hsun (林德訓) to instruct them to lie about inappropriate receipts that
were used in reimbursements for the fund.
Although Ma and Lin allegedly complied with Chen’s request, prosecutors did not
charge Ma because the false testimony was not given when Ma was questioned as a
witness.
Additional perjury cases were opened last September.
Ma and Lin were convicted of helping the former first family launder money in
the first round of legal proceedings at the Taipei District Court last year.
They were sentenced to 16 years and 20 years in prison respectively as well as
being stripped of their civil rights for eight years and 10 years.
Former Hsinchu Science Park head James Lee (李界木) was also charged with perjury
yesterday. Prosecutors allege Lee gave false testimony regarding the
government’s purchase of a plot of land in Longtan (龍潭), Taoyuan County.
In related news, former Yuanta Financial Holding Co president Victor Ma (馬維建)
and former Yuanta Securities Corp board member Tu Li-ping (杜麗萍) yesterday
pleaded guilty in court to helping the former first family launder money.
The two said they hoped that by pleading guilty, they would be able to enter
plea-bargaining to receive lighter sentences.
Another defendant who was summoned to court, Cathay Financial Holdings Co vice
chairman Tsai Chen-yu (蔡鎮宇), yesterday angrily accused prosecutors of ruining
his reputation with false charges.
Tsai defended himself by saying the money he gave to the former first family was
not a bribe, but a political donation, because his father Tsai Wan-lin (蔡萬霖) had
been a long-time supporter of the Democratic Progressive Party.
Tsai said he was following his father’s instructions and denied allegations that
prior to the merger of Cathay Financial Holdings and Cathay United Bank, the
Tsai family bribed the former president into pressuring the Ministry of
Finance to approve the merger.
The indictment of high-profile businesspeople and members of the former first
family were issued on Dec. 24 when Chen and his wife were accused of taking
bribes from executives of banks and financial holding companies who sought to
“protect” themselves and their businesses from being adversely affected during
the second phase of financial reform.
One of the financial consolidation cases involved Yuanta Financial Holding’s
merger with Fuhwa Financial Holding Co, the nation’s 11th-largest financial
group by assets in April 2007.
Prosecutors allege that Chen and his wife took NT$600 million (US$19 million)
from Cathay Financial Group and more than NT$200 million from Yuanta Securities
as a “payment” for ensuring the financial groups’ mergers and acquisitions of
smaller financial institutions went smoothly.
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