Ko in the Crosshairs

The TPP has been embroiled in what seems like an omniscandal for weeks now, culminating in TPP Chairman Ko being detained for 70 hours. But what’s actually going to stick?

TPP Chairman Ko Wen-je released from a grueling 70-hr questioning session without bail speaking to reporters and supporters

Taipei City Prosecutor’s office appeared to “close the net” on Taiwan People’s Party Chairman Ko Wen-je on Friday, taking him in for a 3-day questioning session on suspected corruption. However, in the wee hours of Monday morning, he was released without bail: the the court determined that the evidence provided by the prosecutors was insufficient to justify the detention of Ko and ordered his release without bail.

Surrounded by reporters and supporters at still thronging outside Taipei District Court at three in the morning, former Mayor Ko Wen-je criticized the Taipei City Prosecutors office as being on a fishing expedition and that he suffered “extreme pressure and abuse” during the course of marathon-style questioning designed to wear him down.

Ko was initially taken in for questioning on Friday. After 19 hours of questioning, 64-year old Ko refused to continue, causing the Taipei City Prosecutors office to detain him and and holding him incommunicado.

There are two main lines of inquiry: during the Ko’s presidential run a private company named Muko was established to create and market campaign merch. Was Muko used as a front to launder money? Secondly, during Ko’s tenure as mayor, the redevelopment of the Core Pacific Mall was given very favorable terms. Did the mayor accept bribes from the projects owners?

While these scandals have been brewing for weeks and fired up to fever pitch on both KMT and DPP aligned talk shows, all determined to take Ko down (a few days ago “Ko’s wife went to view some pricey apartments” was endlessly and hysterically litigated), Ko’s core supporters turned up and camped outside the court where Ko was detained, convinced he was being railroaded by a politically motivated judiciary.

So what’s actually going on? Donovan Smith for the Taipei Times did the best blow-by-blow of the TPP terrible horrible no-good month of getting raked over the coals but I will just give my personal take here.

The Muko-related stuff is a nothingburger so far. Campaigns are a whirlwind and even if there have been improper accounting that doesn’t touch Ko without concrete proof that skimmed funds went into Ko’s account. There’s a lot of insinuation that the TPP shouldn’t have created another entity to handle merch. And that since Ko is at the top he should take responsibility. But what “looks funny” doesn’t exactly stand up in the court of law. I’m still not exactly clear what laws were meant to be broken in this case.

The Core Pacific Redevelopment deal is potentially a lot more serious. In any development deal the developer always try to get as high a “Floor Area Ratio” as possible. Let’s say I have 100 meter square of land…how much useable area am I allowed to construct on that land? Obviously the higher the Floor Area Ratio, the higher-up I can build and the more profit I can make. The Core Pacific redevelopment project went from a Floor Area Ratio of 560% to 840% and if it can be proven that Ko put his thumbs on the scale to force the increase in return for a bribe then that is indeed a serious crime and Ko might be in jail for decades if that is proven. But I’m guessing the Taipei Prosecutor’s office doesn’t have the smoking gun. If they did, they would simply take Ko in and keep him in and the court would not have released him without bail.

I know the way things are done in Taiwan is very different from how things are elsewhere but as an American I’m deeply disquieted by the tactics used by the Taipei Prosecutor’s office. The relentless questioning over 19 hours (and possibly longer…I’m not sure if he was simply held for the remainder of that 70 hours or if questioning continued) seems excessively long and the question in my mind is: does that cross the line into coercion. Ko also complained that while he was ostensibly taken in for the Pacific Core redevelopment case, the questions he received were all centered not on that case but on Muko.

The Taipei Prosecutor’s office went in big, not just questioning Ko for basically 3 days in a row but also taking the opportunity to raid TPP offices. Did they have something to solid to go on before they did that? I’m guessing not or Ko would still be in custody. Instead they are likely sifting through the paperwork and hard-drive info they got trying to weave a case.

How the public’s perceive this case depends a lot on their initial political views: for DPP-aligned folks, Ko — who has long stumped on a platform of busting corruption — is finally getting hoisted on his own petard and the prosecutors are right to create maximum pressure to find evidence that he has his hand in the cookie jar. For KMT, the views are split. Despite the “blue-white” alliance the party faithfuls never really liked or trusted Ko and plenty of pundits are delighting in what appears to be prelude to a downfall and actively strategizing on how best to pull his supporters over to the blue camp and avoid an exodus to the green camp. But more sober voices are warning that if the TPP gets crushed that’s of no benefit to the KMT, especially as the two parties have to keep working together for the remainder of the legislative term and the 8 TPP legislators are key for the “blue-white” alliance continue to hold a majority in the legislature.

What I find the most troubling is what appears to be the enormous amount of discretion given to prosecutors in Taiwan to put cases either under the microscope or to let things go. Recall that they had evidence of DPP then-mayor Tseng Wen-tsan receiving literally a bag of money under the table seven years ago. That case was put in the deep freeze for seven years and was only pushed forward recently when Tseng lost his political backing. That’s another story for another time.

For the TPP supporters that came out to camp outside the Taipei Prosecutor’s Office, they remain convinced that Ko is simply being railroaded. I don’t know if they are right, but there is an increasing belief when you look at the differing amount of zest prosecutors go after different cases that the justice system in Taiwan politics is starting to affect the judiciary process, and that is a troubling perception for Taiwan.