, yesterday said if elected, he would pardon over 6,000 officials who could be charged for corruption over the controversial use of their funds. Hsieh made the vow after Vice President Annette Lu and two other DPP heavyweights Yu Shyi-kun and Chen Tan Sun were indicted Friday on corruption charges for using false receipts to claim reimbursement from their special expense accounts.
Apart from the three DPP heavyweights, Hsieh's proposed pardon would also cover over 6,000 incumbent and former government officials, including his Kuomintang contender Ma Ying-jeou, who has already been tried in a case of the same nature.
Hsieh, cleared by prosecutors who indicted the DPP trio, said it is time to revamp a mechanism that "has turned government administrators and the elite into crime suspects."
"If elected president, I would grant a pardon (all those involved) in special expense cases, so as to relieve the law enforcement personnel of their burden, and eliminate the mistrust of the nation's elite," said Hsieh.
But the opposition camp claimed that Hsieh's pardon proposal was only a gimmick aimed at winning votes.
KMT Legislator Wu Yu-sheng said the offer would have been acceptable if it had been made when Ma was indicted in February.
Now that the DPP trio has indicted, and Hsieh and his running mate Su Tseng-chang have been cleared, such an offer only has betrayed Hsieh's "cunning" character, Wu said.
"His aim is to trick voters into supporting him," said Wu.
He stressed Hsieh should instead ask President Chen Shui-bian to immediately pardon all those that have been involved.
But the DPP camp rejected the opposition camp's claims about Hsieh trying to trick voters.
DPP Legislator Wang Tuo said Hsieh is making the pardon proposal because it would not involve any conflict of interest now that he has been cleared by prosecutors.
The KMT side should stop distorting Hsieh's good intentions, Wang said.
The special expenses for government administrators have been ill-defined and governed by lax accounting rules.
Considering the funds as allowances, officials have usually collected irrelevant receipts to claim from the accounts.
The common practice had never been an issue until the DPP camp last year accused Ma of mishandling his special expenses while mayor of Taipei, which prompted prosecutors to launch a probe, and subsequently led to corruption charges against him.
Ma said while there are "obvious" flaws in the special expenses system, prosecutors must work out unified guidelines for handling such cases.
Ma claimed that the prosecutors who cleared Hsieh and his running mate Su Tseng-chang used different standards from those probing his own case.
The KMT candidate urged the prosecutors to clearly explain the legal basis for their investigations.
Vice President Lu, accused of misappropriating NT$5.63 million from her expense account, maintained her innocence, saying her indictment is not acceptable.
She reasoned that she would not have misappropriated the sum, as her voluntary salary cut has reduced her total income by more than NT$30 million over the past seven years.
The vice president blamed the mistakes made when officials file for reimbursements from their special accounts on the "wicked" common practice.
Asked if she will resign over the indictment, she said "it is not necessary."
Yu, a former premier, has tendered his resignation from the DPP chairmanship after his indictment. But Lu said Yu did not need to do so.
President Chen Shui-bian said he believes Lu, Yu, and Chen Tan Sun, secretary-general of the National Security Council (NSC), are innocent.
He said the special expenses are a serious issue and no one should "celebrate" the indictment of others.
Apart from the three DPP heavyweights, prosecutors also indicted eight others, including their aides and Yu's wife Yang Pao-yu, who had helped collect receipts or handle the reimbursements.
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