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KMT assets called
‘root of evil’
UNFAIR ADVANTAGE: While the DPP raised NT$200
million with its ‘three little pigs’ fund-raising campaign, the KMT made NT$2.9
billion from stock dividends in 2010
By Chris Wang / Staff reporter
Taiwan Solidarity Union
Legislator Hsu Chung-hsin, second left, speaks at a forum on the Chinese
Nationalist Party’s (KMT) ill-gotten assets organized by the Taiwan Association
of University Professors in Taipei yesterday.
Photo: Lo Pei-der, Taipei Times
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has so
many ill-gotten assets that even it has no idea how much its assets are worth
and the only certainty is that those assets are the root of all evil in
Taiwanese politics because of the unfair competition that came with them,
analysts said at a forum yesterday.
“In short, the KMT’s party assets are the root of all evil in Taiwan because of
the unfair advantage they created. And despite the KMT having pledged to deal
with the issue, the pledge was only an empty promise,” Democratic Progressive
Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) said.
The forum, titled “Party assets and corruption,” was organized by the Taiwan
Association of University Professors (TAUP) and gathered representatives from
opposition parties and experts.
The KMT took over the assets of the Japanese colonial government and countless
private businesses and individuals after it fled China and took control of
Taiwan, a move many of its detractors have described as outright theft.
The party pledged in 2005 to sell all its assets, which had made it the richest
political party in the world. It claims to this day that it placed most of its
assets into a trust.
However, the gap between political parties’ financial support remains huge.
While the DPP raised about NT$200 million (US$6.7 million) in donations with a
month-long “piggy bank” campaign during the last presidential campaign, the KMT
made NT$3.5 billion in 2010, including NT$2.9 billion from stock dividends, Lee
said.
The KMT earned NT$2.14 billion last year, compared with the DPP’s NT$628
million, according to data released by the Ministry of the Interior.
Those assets have played an important role in the KMT’s dominance in elections
at all levels, which is why it has been slow to deal with the issue, Lee said.
The KMT has blocked the legislative proceedings of a draft statute on the
disposition of assets improperly obtained by political parties in the
legislature more than 250 times and the political party act (政黨法) since 1993,
Lee said.
“Not even the KMT knows how much it has in assets … Some say hundreds of
billions, while some say trillions,” Taiwan Brain Trust researcher Chen Jin-ji
(陳錦稷) said, adding that the party’s tactics to hide its assets have been
carefully crafted over the years.
The calculation of the KMT’s total party assets would be extremely difficult and
complicated, depending on whether some peripheral groups or organizations, such
as the China Youth Corps and the National Women’s League of the Republic of
China, are counted, Zero KMT Alliance executive director Lo Cheng-chung (羅承宗)
said.
Others said that trying to resolve the ill-gotten assets issue in the
legislature would be a waste of time because the KMT has a majority.
Taiwan Referendum Alliance convener Tsay Ting-kuei (蔡丁貴) said the best way would
be a massive protest to force lawmakers to pass the political party act and
force the KMT to speed up divesting its assets through a national referendum.
“Expecting the KMT’s goodwill on the issue would be a waste of time because the
issue has been there for decades. It takes public pressure and action from the
people to get things moving,” Tsai said.
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