The Grand Hotel at Yuanshan used to be Taiwan’s landmark long before the emergence of Taipei 101.It’s the only hotel for visiting heads of state for decades, including President Dwight D. Eisenhower of the United States in 1952.It is government property, administered by a juridical foundation.The foundation, formed by the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, is planning to privatize the Grand Hotel before May 20.
It may be a mere coincidence that the hotel will be privatized on or before the day President Chen Shui-bian steps down.But the fact that the current chairwoman of the foundation, a close friend of Chen’s, has to step down at the same time but will be made the chief executive officer of the privatized Grand Hotel arouses suspicion that he has arranged the privatization as a good-bye present for her.
The privatization of the Grand Hotel, if completed, smacks little of graft, but another case, which involves billions of dollars in possible sales, does.President Chen himself christened a private company with all its capital paid in by government agencies, including the Ministry of National Defense.Taiwan Goal, the firm, was founded late last year without the knowledge of Gen. Lee Tien-yu, the defense minister.Its only business is to purchase weapons and equipment from abroad for the defense ministry.At least one purchase contract has been signed.A few others are under negotiation with French makers.
The case came to light last month with an expose in the mass-circulation China Times and opposition lawmakers are demanding a thorough investigation of the scandal.General Lee resigned to take responsibility and President Chen fired another general, Chen Kuo-hsiang, as head of the MND political warfare department.That department is in charge of internal investigation, and General Chen may have been sacked for ordering a probe or at least so reported by the paper.
Procurement of arms from abroad may have to be privatized.But the government has no control over a nominally private firm that receives hundreds of millions of dollars in kickback for the arms it buys.Of course, there’s no evidence that the president masterminds the privatization of arms purchases, but the timing makes it hard to dismiss the rumor of graft he has plotted on the eve of his departure from office.
Many who went to the polls to elect a new Legislative Yuan on January 12 must have regretted they did not vote for a referendum the Kuomintang had proposed to legislate independent inquiry into top-level government corruption.Had the referendum been adopted, the lawmakers would have formed a special committee to find out what was wrong with the privatization of the Grand Hotel and the founding of Taiwan Goal.
（本文刊載於97.03.03 China Post第4版，本文代表作者個人意見）
