New Bloom (Taipei) — An ongoing corruption probe into a group of pan-Green and pan-Blue politicians accused of taking bribes in a case related to the ownership of the Pacific Sogo department store chain has the potential to become a major scandal for the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Tsai Ing-wen administration.

Over the weekend, prosecutors sought to detain DPP legislator Su Chen-ching, former New Power Party (NPP) chair and legislator Hsu Yung-ming, former DPP legislator Mark Chen, independent legislator Chao Cheng-yu, and Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators Sufin Silko and Liao Kuo-tung, as well as some of these lawmakers’ top aides. This was in response to allegations that they had been receiving bribes from former Pacific Distribution Investment Company Chairman Lee Heng-lung since 2013.

Pacific Distribution Investment Company manages Sogo, and Lee is currently locked in a legal battle with Far Eastern Group over ownership of the chain. The lawmakers were accused of taking bribes from Lee in return for assistance in the ownership struggle over Sogo.

The first major corruption scandal faced by the DPP during the Tsai administration involved cigarette smuggling by members of the National Security Bureau during Tsai’s visit to the United States and overseas Caribbean allies of Taiwan in July 2019. It was feared at the time that the incident would hurt Tsai’s chances for reelection. Tsai was accused of having been either blind to a major smuggling incident taking place on a diplomatic trip or having willingly allowed it to happen.

However, the Sogo corruption probe has the potential to be even more damaging to the Tsai administration, given links between the case and the upper echelons of the DPP.

Su Chen-ching is the nephew of Presidential Office Secretary-General and former Legislative Yuan Majority Speaker Su Jia-chyuan. Although Su claimed in a statement that he had been free of corruption in his thirty years of serving as a politician, Su tendered his resignation as Presidential Office secretary-general, stating that he did not wish to trouble Tsai. In response, Tsai called upon DPP officials to avoid graft and to maintain a clean political record.

In the wake of the scandal, the KMT likely has more ammunition for its claims that the Tsai administration is corrupt. Apart from the cigarette smuggling scandal, the KMT recently sought to prevent former Presidential Office Secretary-General Chen Chu—a veteran politician of the Taiwanese democracy movement—from taking up a post as head of the Control Yuan. The KMT claimed that Chen had been corrupt during her twelve years as Kaohsiung mayor from 2006 to 2018, continuing their trend of accusing former democracy movement activists of being ethically compromised.

The KMT has also recently sought to attack Su Jia-chyuan and Su Chen-ching by claiming that they had traveled to Indonesia in 2017 without reporting this to the relevant government bodies. The KMT claimed that a diplomatic telegram from Taiwan’s representative office in Indonesia had stated that Su Chen-ching traveled to Indonesia along with high-level officials of Taiwanese state-run enterprises in order to meet with members of the Indonesian government in August 2017, while failing to notify the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) or the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) of this arrangement. According to the KMT, Su Jia-chyuan later joined his nephew in traveling to Indonesia to conduct further meetings, while refusing coordination with MOFA or MOEA. Su was at that time the majority speaker of the Legislative Yuan.

In response to media questions, MOFA said it had no records of Su Jia-chyuan or Su Chen-ching traveling to Indonesia in 2017, but did not comment on the veracity of the diplomatic telegram. More recent corruption charges against Su Chen-ching will likely add weight to the KMT’s accusations.

The KMT itself has faced a number of corruption cases in past months, implicating KMT city councilors, former legislators, and others. But given that the KMT has faced so many cases in past months and news of pan-Blue corruption is, in fact, a regular feature of the news cycle, a major corruption case within the pan-Green camp is likely to generate wider coverage. As the ruling party, the DPP is bound receive greater scrutiny regarding corruption scandals. The KMT can be expected to ignore that two of its legislators were also implicated in the case.

In particular, the case will be a stumbling block to the NPP, which has suspended Hsu Yung-ming from his position as chair and named current legislator Handy Chiu as acting chair until the next set of chair elections. Younger politicians within the NPP, such as Taipei city councilor Meredith Huang, have called on Hsu to explain his actions, and for Hsu to be suspended from party positions until an investigation clarifies what took place.

Hsu is a former member of the DPP, having joined the NPP in 2016 after the DPP passed over nominating him as a legislative candidate in Taichung. This may explain his ties with DPP politicians.

The NPP previously suffered a corruption scandal in late July and early August 2019 with legislator Kawlo Iyun removed from her post after charges of improper usage of public funds. However, that previous incident was quickly overshadowed by news that NPP legislators Freddy Lim and Hung Tzu-yung would be departing the party over its initial refusal to openly endorse Tsai Ing-wen in the 2020 elections. Indeed, Hsu became party chair in August 2019 in the wake of Lim and Hung’s departure, something that led to outrage from those who demanded the appointment of one of the party’s younger voices.

The Sogo-related charges against Hsu will damage the NPP’s image as a party free of the traditional taint of corruption in Taiwanese politics, especially since it is a youth-oriented party that emerged from the 2014 Sunflower Movement. Contributing to the damage will be former NPP Chair and legislator Huang Kuo-chang’s involvement in an ownership struggle over Tatung Company. Tatung is one of Taiwan’s most recognizable appliance brands.

Huang sided with one faction of Tatung stockholders after being named as a candidate for an independent director position on the board, leading to accusations that he was being paid off by Tatung board members. What particularly raised eyebrows was that, despite Huang’s key role in the 2014 Sunflower Movement, the Tatung faction that Huang sided with was seen as being more pro-China. Huang later failed to be elected to the board as an independent director, but the case is now under investigation by the Financial Supervisory Commission.

Huang’s actions are similar to Hsu’s in the sense that they became involved in an ownership struggle over one of Taiwan’s largest and most well-known companies. Though Huang has condemned corruption in public comments after news of the incident, Hsu and Huang have long been seen as allies within the NPP, with both seen as among the stronger voices within the party opposed to endorsing Tsai Ing-wen in the lead-up to the 2020 presidential elections.

Younger elements of the NPP that previously found themselves in conflict with Hsu and Huang, primarily city councilors, will likely have their position within the party strengthened by the scandal. Although the NPP only has three legislators after the results of 2020 elections, the NPP currently has sixteen city councilors.

This article was originally published in New Bloom.

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