Chen said that he has not made any remarks regarding changing premiers in recent days, adding that Su has been “doing a good job.”

The president made the statements in response to reporters’ questions after speaking at a ceremony held in Tainan County, southern Taiwan to mark the groundbreaking for the construction of a Matou port historic and cultural park.

Chen said he is satisfied with Su’s performance and appealed to the public to continue supporting the premier.

Su went to see the president hours after Chen returned Saturday from his four day state visit to Nicaragua.

Chen reportedly expressed support for Su and his administration’s handling of the Rebar scandal and instructed them to get to the bottom of the matter.

The scandal triggered a run on The Chinese Bank, an affiliate of the Rebar Group, which lost NT$32 billion in deposits in three days despite government assurances on the safety of the deposits with full backing from the national coffers.

The country’s top financial regulator, Chairman Shih Jun-ji of the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) and a member of Su’s Cabinet, resigned Saturday over the incident.

Two subsidiaries of the Rebar Asia Pacific Group, which is comprised of 120-odd subsidiaries, applied for insolvency protection Dec. 29.

The group’s founder, Wang You-theng, and his wife fled to China in late December. Investigators have been expanding the probe into suspected embezzlement, insider trading and other frauds involving the group.

The Rebar Group scams drew harsh criticisms from the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) that held Chen’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) accountable for failing to detect the problems and take earlier actions during the long period of the past seven years.

Despite being a long-term KMT member, Wang and his business conglomerate have managed to cultivate close ties with the new ruling party since 2007. Wang personally accompanied President Chen on most of his overseas visits.

In a move to placate public discontent, Chen and other DPP leaders made remarks that were interpreted as an attempt to dump all the blame on Premier Su. Local media reported that Su was preparing to fight back.

Invited to deliver a closed-door speech to a seminar attended by members of the Chinese National Federation of Industries (CNFI) and organizations related to the Junior Chamber of Commerce Saturday, Su reportedly said that all DPP leaders were only siting on their hands while he toiled alone like a fireman trying to put out the fire.

Su even said that someone even chided him “all the way from abroad back to Taiwan.” The gripe was widely interpreted as talking about the president, although Su did not mention Chen by name, according to a report of the United Evening News.

The same paper also quoted Su’s close aides that many people in the DPP are planning to use the Rebar scandal to remove Su from the premiership.

Removing Su could help simplify the heated contests among the four leading contenders within the DPP jogging for the party’s nomination for the presidential election next March, said most analysts.

Former Premier Frank Hsieh, who is presently rated by many as the pace setter for the presidential race, said based on his personal experience, he could understand the intense pressure on the person holding premiership.

Hsieh served only briefly as premier before being removed by President Chen and replaced by Su.

When asked to comment about his enjoying higher popularity over other DPP leaders as a DPP candidate, Hsieh said Taiwan society tends to give greater warmth to people who just lost elections.

Hsieh suffered a setback in the just concluded mayoral election in Taipei last month.

Cheng Wen-tsang, chief of the Government Information office (GIO) and spokesman of the Cabinet led by Su, denied the media reports about the rift between President Chen and Premier Su as well as the plan to remove Su from office.

He clarified that the Presidential Office and the Executive Yuan (Cabinet) have high consensus on how to handle the crisis sparked by the Rebar scams.

Cheng stressed that there are no grudges held between President Chen and Premier Su as alleged by local media.

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