The ceremony for official formation of the “Vote Buying and Violence Investigation and Supervision Taskforce” of the Supreme Prosecutors Office took place at 10:00am on August 31, 2010, with Minister Zheng of Justice and Prosecutor General Huang jointly unveiling plaque.

• Publication Date： 2010-08-31
• Last updated：2018-11-02
• View count：2144

Supreme Prosecutors Office News Release, August 31, 2010 The ceremony for official formation of the “Vote Buying and Violence Investigation and Supervision Taskforce” of the Supreme Prosecutors Office took place at 10:00am on August 31, 2010, with Minister Zheng of Justice and Prosecutor General Huang jointly unveiling plaque. “Vote Buying and Violence Investigation and Enforcement Taskforces” of various district prosecutors offices are also formed simultaneously, to officially commence investigation work for the 2010 direct municipal city mayors, legislative members and neighborhood supervisors. Both the Minister of Justice and the Prosecutor General spoke after unveiling of the plaque. In his speech, the Minister of Justice indicated that the Ministry has issued the guidelines for vote buying investigation work in June 2010, instructing “one goal, three demands”. “One goal” refers to the vote buying investigation goal of “thorough investigation of vote buying, tracking to the highest level” – the taskforces should not be satisfied with merely finding the people who buy or sell votes, but should track them to the highest sources, that is the election candidates themselves and their major supporters. “Three demands” refer to “fairness, quality and efficiency”; “fairness” means that prosecutions will be based purely on evidence, without regard for party affiliation or personal status; “quality” means that collection of evidence during the investigation process must be comprehensive and refined; “efficiency” means that thorough planning must take place in advance, so as to achieve the optimum efficiency in prosecuting illegal acts within the shortest period of time. The Minister reminds all candidates hoping to buy votes and electors ignoring the rule of law to understand the Government’s determination to prosecute vote buying, and also hopes for widespread public support in our efforts, so that the oncoming elections will be even more transparent and more consistent with the public’s expectations of democracy. The Prosecutor General also emphasizes that the prosecutors offices will absolutely enforce the Minister’s instructions and guidelines, and solemnly announces that the guiding principle for vote buying investigations by all prosecutorial, police, investigative and governmental ethical personnel is “no bottom lines, no upper limits, and no time constraints”. Any rumors of vote buying will be thoroughly investigated, and investigative efforts will not end with the conclusion of elections; once substantive evidence of vote buying has been found, the relevant offenders will be strictly prosecuted without leniency, irrespective of the position, status or party affiliation of the defendant. Finally the Prosecutor General calls upon all electors to work with the prosecutorial, investigative and police personnel in performing the role of an “vote buying terminator” – let us all work together in monitoring the oncoming elections and proactively report against any attempts to buy votes, hunting vote buying out of Taiwan and prevent it from becoming the greatest shame in our implementation of political democracy. Supreme Prosecutors Office