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EDITORIAL: Ma should
be held accountable
With the beginning of the new legislative session and details of the
investigation into the improper lobbying and wiretapping case involving
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) being revealed little by little, the
public is finally getting an idea of the full extent of the controversy and the
political maneuvers behind it.
Prosecutor-General Huang Shih-ming (黃世銘) appeared to be in trouble when the
Presidential Office proclaimed that “anything that went beyond the red line of
the judiciary would not be tolerated” — a move that sets up Huang as a scapegoat
for the wiretapping and the plotting that attempted to force Wang from his
legislator-at-large seat.
Huang’s exit would seem to be necessary. He had led a Supreme Prosecutors’
Office Special Investigation Division’s (SID) investigation which resorted to
wiretapping not only Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus whip Ker
Chien-ming (柯建銘), but also the Legislative Yuan’s switchboard and one of his own
prosecutors, Lin Shiow-tao (林秀濤). Adding his improper report about wiretapped
conversations to President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九), Huang clearly violated the
Constitution.
However, Ma’s role in the scandal should not be ignored. If Huang has to be held
accountable for his abuse of power, Ma should also be responsible for the
current political turmoil and, most importantly, his own undermining of
constitutional procedures.
While Ma has repeatedly said that the entire incident — the wiretapping of Ker
and Wang, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) revoking Wang’s party membership —
was neither a conspiracy nor politically motivated, Huang’s testimony at a
legislature’s question-and-answer session revealed that he had met with Ma twice
on, Aug. 31 and Sept. 1, with the latter meeting requested by the president.
The two met five days before the investigation was closed, violating the
principle of secrecy of investigation. And while Ma and Huang tried to “put out
the fire” by explaining that they were investigating a case of administrative
misconduct rather than criminal activities, a meeting of this type between a
president and a prosecutor-general was still improper.
Ma’s use of wiretaps on his political rivals is not surprising, since the KMT
long used surveillance as part of its ruling strategy. Ma himself spied on
Taiwanese students on US campuses during the 1970s when he attended Harvard
University. His history demonstrates the irony of Ma’s 2008 promise that no
political and illegal wiretapping would be allowed under his administration.
Politically motivated wiretapping is intolerable because it infringes on
people’s constitutional right to private communication.
The gravity of this controversy does not come from the alleged improper lobbying
by Wang or even from the vicious infighting within the KMT, neither of which
directly threatens the rule of law. Instead the gravity lies in Ma going beyond
the “red line” of the constitutional separation of powers by meeting Huang and
holding a televised press conference as president to denounce the legislative
speaker, while Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) and Vice President Wu Den-yih (吳敦義)
looked on.
As of now Huang insists that he will not offer an apology, arguing that the fate
of Jiang and Ma would be bundled together with his own.
However, all signs point to Huang’s becoming another “Yu Wen” (余文), a reference
to the Taipei City staffer who served nine months in jail for failing to keep
Ma’s special allowance funds as Taipei mayor in order. Yu was widely seen as a
sacrificial lamb.
Ma should not be able to avoid taking responsibility this time by having someone
else take the blame. There is enough solid evidence to prove that Ma’s foul play
put at risk constitutional mechanisms. He is advised to apologize and step down.
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