Gou claims Want Want head is TAO ‘hatchet man’

By Hung Ting-hung and Sherry Hsiao / Staff reporter, with staff writer





Former Hon Hai Precision Industry Co chairman Terry Gou (郭台銘) yesterday accused Want Want Group chairman Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明) of being a “hatchet man” for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO).

Gou, who resigned on Friday last week as company chairman to pursue the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) nomination for next year’s presidential election, made the claim when leaving Kaohsiung’s Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum to visit the Fo Guang Shan Sutra Repository.

A reporter with the Want Want Group-owned CtiTV had asked him if he was “truly unafraid” of the Chinese threat, and whether a comment that Gou made on Tuesday during the KMT’s first televised forum — “Who is afraid of whom?” — still held true.

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential hopeful Terry Gou, center right, visits the Fo Guang Shan Monastery in Kaohsiung’s Dashu District yesterday. Photo: Hung Ting-hung, Taipei Times

“Do not ask this type of question,” Gou said, adding after a pause: “A media controlled by the TAO has no right to ask me.”

“Ask your own conscience: Are you for the Republic of China or for the TAO?” he said.

“Ask your boss Tsai, the TAO’s hatchet man and a sycophant,” he added.

Later, after Gou visited Fo Guang Shan’s Master Hsing Yun (星雲法師), the CtiTV reporter asked him if he had any evidence that the media outlet was controlled by the TAO.

Gou said his comments had been directed at the media head, not at the reporter, and requested the reporter to not discuss the matter at a religious site.

CtiTV said it had no comment about “a presidential candidate with no love and no tolerance.”

Gou told reporters that he had asked the Buddhist master how to give Taiwanese confidence, happiness, hope and convenience.

The master told him he would be able to achieve it by acting on his words, Gou said, adding that the master also told him to be pragmatic and honest, and to lead by example.

Additional reporting by Hung Su-chin