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Ma re-election team
slams ‘three little pigs’ campaign
ROW BREWS: Ma’s campaign spokesperson says that
the DPP’s returned piggy banks given to it by three-year-old triplets showed
that the party acknowledged its mistakes
By Mo Yan-chih / Staff Reporter
Hsieh Ming-yuan, fifth left, the
Democratic Progressive Party’s legislative candidate for Greater Taichung’s
North and Beitun districts, and supporters display piggy banks at his campaign
headquarters yesterday. Hsieh is scheduled to distribute 1,000 piggy banks to
raise campaign funds.
Photo: Tsai Shu-yuan, Taipei Times
President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) re-election
campaign office yesterday questioned the legitimacy of Democratic Progressive
Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) “three little pigs” donation
campaign and accused Tsai’s camp of using children as a campaign tool.
Tsai, the DPP’s presidential candidate, and her election team launched the
“three little pigs” campaign late last month after the Control Yuan warned the
DPP about a possible violation of the Act Governing Political Donations
(政治獻金管理條例) when the party accepted piggy banks donated by three-year-old
triplets. The act stipulates that only people of voting age who meet other
voting eligibility requirements are allowed to make political donations.
The DPP returned the piggy banks to the children, but the incident sparked a fad
among Tsai’s supporters to put their donations in piggy banks. The DPP later
declared this month “little pigs month” and has used children as campaign
spokespeople to call on supporters to fill piggy banks to support Tsai’s
campaign.
Ma’s campaign spokesperson Lee Chia-fei (李佳霏) yesterday said the DPP should put
a stop to the piggy bank drive, as it violates the law by seeking political
donations from children.
Lee denied that the campaign team or the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)
reported the piggy bank incident to the Control Yuan and said the DPP’s act of
returning the piggy banks to the triplets showed that the party acknowledged its
mistakes.
“We are not against the participation of children in campaign activities, but it
is illegal to solicit political donations from children ... If such an incident
happened in our camp, would the DPP keep quiet about it?” she said.
Lee said the campaign team had received complaints from parents who said they
were saddened to see children appear at DPP fundraisers because they seemed to
be used as a campaign ploy.
In Ma’s campaign souvenir shops, she said, campaign staff would remind
supporters that only Taiwanese over the age of 20 are qualified to buy campaign
products.
“We cautiously follow legal regulations and we urge the DPP to stop flouting the
law immediately,” she said.
In response, DPP spokesperson Lin Chun-hsien (林俊憲) hit back at the KMT for
“never understanding [the virtue] of engaging in introspection.”
The KMT doesn’t understand that it [the three little pigs campaign] reflects
people’s grievances about the current situation and their desire for change,”
Lin said, adding that “the more the KMT oppresses [the three little pigs
campaign], the stronger the support from the people [for the campaign.]”
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