|
SID closes probe into Ma-Wu campaign finances
By Rich Chang / Staff reporter
The Special Investigation Division (SID) of the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office yesterday announced that it has closed investigations into funding of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Vice President Wu Den-yih’s (吳敦義) 2012 election campaign and would not issue any indictments.
Allegations of bribery and suspicious funding during the campaign were raised after local prosecutors investigating separate cases in Changhua and Nantou counties found links to funding for the Ma-Wu ticket.
Prosecutors investigating the younger brother of Changhua County Commissioner Cho Po-yuan (卓伯源), a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) member, over allegations that he had used the commissioner’s influence to win government contracts, discovered the Ma-Wu campaign had offered the Chos 1,300 plates to use as gifts for voters.
The plates, with Ma and Wu’s photographs on them, were valued at NT$91 apiece. The SID said the plates were distributed during a fundraising diner where each attendee paid at least NT$1,000, which would make the gift legal.
Nantou prosecutors investigating corruption allegations against then-Nantou County commissioner Lee Chao-ching (李朝卿), also a KMT member, turned up two suspicious funds — each one with NT$500,000 — that had gone to the Ma-Wu campaign.
The SID said it traced the money and concluded the two funds were political donations collected from a friend of Lee’s younger brother.
source: Taipei Times
|
