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Mar 21, 2008

Taipei Times article on the vote buying

Here's the link and some of the more important paragraphs.

Hsieh said the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) intended to spend NT$470
million (US$15.3 million) and to mobilize at least 200,000 people during the
vote.
"This is out-and-out vote-buying in disguised form," Hsieh said. "The
country will not have any future if political parties buy their way into the
Presidential Office."
Hsieh said the KMT would pay exuberant sums -- estimated at NT$240 million
-- to people it would deploy at voting stations.
Voting captains would be
handed NT$49 million while mobilization fees were estimated to amount to NT$180
million, he said.
Vote-buying is a legal issue, Hsieh said. Previously, vote-buying was
direct distribution of cash, but now it is hidden in various forms and the KMT
openly includes it in its campaign plan, he said....
In response, KMT Chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) said yesterday that the party
would not get involved in vote-buying or other illegal acts during the election.
Wu said the party's budget for the election was only one-third of the budget
for the 2004 presidential election and that the KMT's bank accounts were
transparent.
KMT Legislator Chang Hsien-yao (張顯耀) and Ma camp lawyer Lai
Su-ju (賴素如) filed a lawsuit against Hsieh, charging him with violation of
Article 90 of the President and Vice President Election and Recall Law
(總統副總統選舉罷免法), which stipulates that "anyone who spreads rumors or untruths
through words, pictures, recordings, speeches or other means in a bid to help or
prevent a certain candidate from being elected will be subject to five years in
prison."
KMT Organization and Development Committee director Liao Fung-te
(廖風德) said the party had set up an "anti-dirty trick" program, which included
the "Blue-Eagle," "Voting Booth" and the "Bee" projects.
Liao said the
"Blue-Eagle" project is a training program with more than 40,000 volunteers who
will be sent by the KMT to supervise vote counting at polling stations to
prevent election fraud. Each volunteer will receive NT$1,000.

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