Taipei: An associate of former President Ma Ying-jeou on Monday publicly accused two ex-employees of Ma's foundation of financial misconduct, despite an internal investigation that cleared the two of wrongdoing a day earlier.
According to Focus Taiwan, an investigative committee had issued a statement on Sunday, declaring that there was no evidence of financial misconduct by the Ma Ying-jeou Foundation's former chief executive, Hsiao Hsu-tsen, and employee Wang Kuang-tzu.
Despite the investigation's findings, Ma Ying-jeou dismissed the results, asserting that the foundation possessed incriminating evidence against Hsiao and Wang. Ma announced that he would instruct Tai Hsia-ling, the current foundation chair, to disclose this evidence to the public.
During a press conference on Monday, Tai, along with King Pu-tsung, a Ma associate and former secretary-general of the National Security Council, and two others, presented what they claimed was evidence against the two former employees. Tai unveiled a photo, alleging it showed Hsiao meeting with Song Tao, director of China's Taiwan Affairs Office, in China, in his capacity as vice chairman of the Kuomintang (KMT) on October 28 of last year.
The contentious photo also appeared to depict Wang and two members of the three-person investigative committee - foundation board members Hsueh Hsiang-chuan and Lee De-wei - present at the meeting.