Brian Hioeby Brian Hioe
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Photo Credit: Solomon203/WikiCommons/CC BY-SA 4.0
AFTER A COURT RULING, the Taipei High Administrative Court ruled the Chinese Women’s League (CWL) to be a KMT-affiliated organization before 2004.
The ruling runs counter to the organization’s claims to have no official relationship with the KMT, and that it was not run by the KMT, with the CWL claiming to merely be a civic organization. As such, the CWL has been ordered to pay 17.89 billion NT to the government in assets. The cash assets of the organization, which are valued at 38.5 billion NT, have also been frozen.
While the ruling upholds a 2018 judgment that found the CWL to be a KMT-affiliated organization, the ruling can be appealed, which means that legal contention over the CWL’s fate is not over.
In light of the KMT’s efforts to set a minimum number of justices for the Constitutional Court to make majority rulings, then act to block any appointments proposed by the Lai administration, the KMT will likely try to drag on the matter as long as possible until the case reaches the Constitutional Court. This would be in the hopes that the Constitutional Court is, at that time, KMT-controlled and would rule in the CWL’s favor.
The CWL was originally an organization founded by the KMT as a means of mobilizing women as political supporters. Founded as the Chinese Women’s Anti-Communist League in 1950 by Soong Mei-ling, also known as Madame Chiang Kai-Shek, the organization conducted fundraising on behalf of the ROC government and “entertained troops to boost morale,” given the gendered nature of the organization.
During this period in time, the CWL was directly funded by the ROC government, with funding coming from the Military Benefit Tax placed on all American goods imported into Taiwan between 1955 and 1989. Notably, the CWL continued to benefit from close ties to the ROC state even into the post-authoritarian period.
The Chinese Women’s League. Photo credit: Solomon203/WikiCommons/CC BY-SA 4.0
Indeed, the total assets of the CWL were originally valued at 38.1 billion NT, larger than the total assets the KMT reported that it possessed in 2017, at 18.1 billion NT. The CWL was accused of being an ostensibly private organization that the KMT funneled its party assets into as a means of avoiding scrutiny by DPP governments into what assets the KMT illicitly retains from land and property seizures conducted during the authoritarian period.
The Executive Yuan’s Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee ordered the CWL’s assets frozen in 2018 after ruling that the league was a KMT-affiliated party organization, then ordered the confiscation of NTD 38.8 billion, which would leave the league with 246 million NTD. Nevertheless, the CWL put in a legal challenge against the Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee that was formed under the Tsai administration to address the issue of the KMT’s party assets, with the case having dragged on until now.
Facing such challenges, the CWL proposed several means to try and stay afloat, including transitioning to a private organization or becoming a political party. The CWL also accused the DPP of being motivated by misogyny in its investigation into the assets of the league, and alleged that the DPP was more broadly targeting charities and foundations in Taiwan.
The KMT has begun efforts intended to roll back the DPP’s targeting of its party assets. Earlier this year, drawing on its control of the legislature, the KMT sought party assets laws for the China Youth Corps (CYC) that would allow it to take back or retain its assets. The CYC is another organization formed by the KMT during authoritarian times, except to mobilize the youth demographic rather than of women. It, too, enjoyed close ties to the party-state. In 2017, it was also found that over 50 former CYC employees receive pensions normally reserved for public servants.
KMT party assets are thought primarily to come from land seizures from when the KMT assumed control of Taiwan after the end of the Japanese colonial period. In 2014, reported KMT assets totaled 26.8 billion NTD (855 million USD), and 981.52 million NTD (31.3 million USD) was generated from interest on KMT party assets.
The KMT’s party assets were estimated to be between 200 billion NTD (6.4 billion USD) and 500 billion NTD (16 billion USD) in the early 2000s and there were even larger claims by Wealth Magazine (財訊月刊) in 2000 that KMT assets could be as high as 600 billion NTD (19.1 billion USD) and further reports that KMT assets could be over 900 billion NTD (28.7 billion USD). This could indeed make the KMT one of the world’s richest political parties. Assets, then, included holdings in everything from news agencies, construction companies, hospitals, and karaoke to 870 pieces of real estate scattered across Taiwan from Taipei to Kaohsiung, though seemingly concentrated in Taipei. The issue of the authoritarian legacy of the KMT’s assets remains unresolved in Taiwan, then–the CWL and CYC are merely two such examples.