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DPP Chairman Su urges
parole for Chen Shui-bian
By Chris Wang / Staff reporter
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) should seize the opportunity to facilitate social
harmony and accommodate mainstream public opinion by granting former president
Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) medical parole, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairman
Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said yesterday.
Su made the appeal again after visiting the imprisoned Chen, who was moved from
Taipei Veterans General Hospital to Taichung Prison’s Pei Teh Hospital in
Greater Taichung on Friday.
Veterans Hospital physicians and the private medical team of the former
president, who is serving an 20-year sentence for corruption, advised Chen be
allowed home care, so he could recover from a number of illnesses, including
severe depression, sleep apnea, non-typical Parkinson’s disease, a speech
disorder and mild cerebral atrophy, Su said.
The environment at Pei-Te Hospital is questionable, even though Chen now has an
area of 803m2 of his own, Su said.
Taichung Prison was unable to answer which hospital — Taichung Veterans General
Hospital or China Medical University Hospital — would be in charge of Chen’s
treatment and Chen was still subject to video surveillance and inspections by
hospital employees every 15 minutes, which is causing Chen’s anxiety-related
depression, Su said.
Su also lamented Ma’s description of DPP lawmakers’ clash with the Ministry of
Justice after Chen’s transfer on Friday as “offenses of obstructing an officer
in discharge of duties” and the ministry’s statement that it planned to bring
the DPP lawmakers to justice for their conduct.
Su was referring to incidents in which, after Chen’s sudden transfer on Friday,
a group of DPP lawmakers barged into a ministry press conference and broke into
Minister of Justice Tseng Yung-fu’s (曾勇夫) office.
DPP Legislator Chiu Yi-ying (邱議瑩) kicked and damaged the office door, while her
colleagues shouted “chicken, come out.”
While the lawmakers have to held accountable for their behavior, it is
“regrettable” that the head of state is “only trying to intensify social and
political division,” Su said.
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