3/4/2004 10:22 PM
Subject: Regarding the case of human rights abuses at National Cheng Kung
University, in TainanTo: tainan@hef.org.tw, hefpp@hef.org.tw
Humanities Education Foundation
Tainan, Taiwan
5 March 2004
Dear Humanities Education Foundation,
I contacted you a couple of weeks ago concerning human rights abuses at
National Cheng Kung University. I hope you recognize the serious issues
involved and concern yourself with this case.
In 1999, university officials at National Cheng Kung University (NCKU)
in Tainan held secret meetings and passed around a secret letter in order to
insure my dismissal. Knowing it had made too many mistakes, the university
canceled the dismissal in December, 1999.
But this was a trick. The university argued foreigners had to be
reviewed again. This allowed the university to undo its mistakes and delay
the case. No respectable university should use tricks instead of laws and
moral principles.
Moreover, the university's action was against Taiwan law and Ministry
rulings. Taiwan's government supports the Teachers' Law for all teachers
equally.
The benefits of final appeals are guaranteed by human rights
principles. If the appeal process allows later review, appeals are
useless. Why appeal if one will lose sooner or later?
If the university believed foreigners were not protected by appeal, it
should have said so from the beginning. The law insures justice, not
trickery.
On 8 January 2001, the Ministry of Education canceled my dismissal.
Its ruling bold-faced human rights violations made by NCKU officials.
Yet the university president defied that ruling and eight warning
letters for more than two years. After outside pressure, the university
finally issued back and current teaching contracts. This was in May 2003.
But soon after a university committee spitefully revived and approved
accusations rejected in the Ministry ruling, as if that ruling had no legal
benefit. Instead, the university imposed a penalty that denied me annual
increments and promotion for six years.
No university should deny the benefits of an appeal ruling, recognized
by all human rights charters. These benefits include the right to
compensation and protection from revival of accusations decided on appeal.
If accusations could be revived, the party with more power (money,
resources, time, and lawyers) would win. But an appeal process insures that
justice, not power, wins.
Yet as recently as the end of last year, Kao Chiang, the current
president of the university (06-2757575-50000), defended his action when
this case was exposed by The China Times (12-23-03). He claimed he didn’t
know what to do. As if a university president doesn’t know how to obey the
law, when children know. Faculty Union members repeatedly warned him to
respect the law and human rights. A human rights group based in America
also warned him. He ignored them and eight warning letters from the
Ministry of Education. Yet he claimed to The China Times that he didn't
know what to do! An official who misrepresents the public has no business
being president of a national university.
In that China Times article, Professor Kao is reported saying it was
“reasonable” to deny me teaching pay, since I didn't teach during the years
of my illegal dismissal. Yet Professor Kao knows I didn't teach because I
was illegally dismissed and he defied a legal Ministry ruling for more than
two years. If an appellant is denied compensation and back pay after
winning an appeal, he has really lost.
Forced to issue teaching contracts, the university now tries to undo
other benefits of the ruling. It approved accusations rejected in that
ruling and denies compensation and apology. But human rights principles
insure compensation and protect against revival of adjudged accusations. In
its revisionist view, the university won the case, not I.
Apart from the failure to enforce the Ministry ruling, an official who
defies a legal Ministry ruling for more than two years should not head a
national university. A lawyer who advises or cooperates with noncompliance
of a ruling should be denied employment at taxpayers’ expense. Instead he
should be subject to ethical penalties, assuming there is a bar (lawyer)
association in Taiwan.
If the university wished to contest a legal ruling, it should have
enforced the ruling first. In the law I know, noncompliance with the law,
or delaying its execution, is “obstruction of justice,” a serious offense.
It caused the removal of an American president. Even if it is not a legal
offense under Taiwan law, it is a moral offense unacceptable for a
university official or tax-paid legal adviser.
The law allows the full use of the law but not obstruction of the law.
American judges warn lawyers when moral or legal lines are crossed. They
advise removal from the bar of lawyers who misbehave.
The university had no legal basis to file a lawsuit. Not liking to
lose is not a legal basis. As if the law is concerned with face rather than
right.
The lawyer claimed in court that foreign faculty had no right to
appeal. But the university never objected to my appeal until it lost the
appeal. In the law I know, a challenge is made before a ruling, or the
chance is lost. This insures legal principle instead of trickery.
Moreover, the university lawyer at first concealed the Ministry ruling
from the court, as if it never happened. If the Ministry ruling had favored
the university, the university would have accepted it as legal. But since
the ruling favored me, the lawyer claimed I had no right to appeal. This is
like a child knocking game pieces off a board after losing.
Is this conduct allowed in a university official? Are these the values
young people should follow?
Such tricks might be ignored if made by a prviate business with no
moral values to uphold. But they should not be accepted at a national
university.
A university without moral principle cannot stand. Nor should lawyers
who advise or cooperate in defying a legal ruling be paid at public cost.
If there is no bar association in Taiwan to control ethics of lawyers, let
the lawyer work at private, not public, expense. The university's lawsuit
cost Taiwan taxpayers millions of dollars in back pay. This money could
have funded dozens of scholarships for poor students.
Before the university finally issued contracts under pressure,
Professor Kao appointed two officials to force an unfair settlement. The
two warned me at a meeting with Faculty Union members that if I didn’t quit
the university and accept half pay as settlement, they would use the courts
to delay enforcement of the Ministry ruling for as long as possible. I told
them they should be ashamed of themselves, since I had won a legal ruling
and was entitled to full benefits of that ruling.
It seems some officials at National Cheng Kung University have no moral
or legal principles. This is not good for the
future of our university.
Most recently, Professor Ko Huei-chen (06-2757575-50300), Dean of
Student Affairs, has refused to punish the student who wrote a spiteful and
secret letter used at my dismissal hearings in 1999. The student's letter
was dated the day of a dismissal hearing in June 1999, which shows that
university officials requested it for that purpose.
This student accused me of failing her unfairly eight years before.
What decent committee would accept a letter
contesting a grade eight years before, without proof and in secret? This
further shows the lack of moral and legal standards at our university.
A colleague had sent me an email one year before this student wrote her
spiteful letter, warning me the student would accuse me in exchange for
university employment. (I have a copy of this email.) This student worked
in the president’s office, became a graduate student, and is now a part-time
teacher at our university. The tax-paying public has a right to know if a
student has achieved this on merit or by deceit.
Many students wish to be admitted to our graduate school or obtain
employment at our university. It is unfair if they lost out on the chance
because they behaved well while another student succeeded because she
behaved badly.
These issues concern the public welfare. That an adminstration appeal
lasts more than four years should also be of concern.
Administration remedy that lasts more than a few weeks is not remedy,
but trickery. Major murder trials in America don't last more than a few
months! The number of documents I've picked up at post offices all over
Tainan is beyond count but is more than a hundred. This is a mockery of
justice and an abuse of remedy. The fact that university officials have
still not been punished only adds to the scandal.
Apart from human rights abuses, what values are officials at our
university teaching the next generation? To ignore these abuses will affect
not only the future of education in Taiwan but the future of democracy here.
Like Iruan's relatives in Brazil I respected the law in Taiwan. But,
like Iruan's relatives, I've been denied justice.
Sincerely,
Professor Richard de Canio
Department of Foreign Languages and Literature
National Cheng Kung University
Tainan, Taiwan
06-2378626
2757575-52235
