Third education minister quits over university wrangle

Yet another education minister in Taiwan quit his post on 25 December, less than 24 hours after a decision on the leadership of the country’s top university, National Taiwan University (NTU). Yeh Jiunn-rong is the third education minister to resign in the space of a single year over the controversial NTU leadership issue.

Yeh had been in the post since May 2018, and quit after approving Kuan Chung-ming as NTU president on 24 December, saying the dispute over Kuan should be “left in 2018”.

Kuan had been selected by a university committee a year ago, on 5 January 2018, and was due to take over as the new head of NTU the following month, but the required endorsement of his presidency was held up by then education minister Pan Wen-chung over controversies over the process of Kuan’s selection by the university, which was mired in conflict of interest allegations, as well as allegations that Kuan had taken up posts at universities in Mainland China, in breach of the rules for public servants.

In a press conference on 24 December, Yeh announced that his ministry had “reluctantly agreed” to Kuan’s appointment as NTU president, before resigning as minister the following day.

Officially, Yeh stated that he made the decision which best served all parties, and emphasised he had acted “in accordance with the powers and responsibilities of the office of Minister of Education”.

In a separate personal statement, Yeh said he was resigning to take "political responsibility for any problems his decision on Kuan's case would or could cause". He said the NTU selection process had resulted in "serious damage to Taiwan's education system, which should not be a battleground for social differences and standoffs".

Deputy Minister for Education Yao Leeh-ter now takes over as acting education minister.

Uproar over unilateral decision

But Yeh’s surprise end-of-year decision, seen as a major political climbdown after months of a stalemate with NTU, unleashed uproar among legislators after it was reported that Yeh apparently approved Kuan unilaterally without consulting the country’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, or the premier, William Lai.

According to Taiwan media reports, a statement from President Tsai’s office said the Executive Yuan (cabinet) had not been prepared for Yeh’s approval of Kuan, and legislators of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) also had no prior notice.

“As a member of a team, relevant decisions should be fully communicated and discussed…The handling of the situation yesterday needs to be reviewed,” said a spokesperson for the Executive Yuan on 25 December.

The row over Kuan’s appointment centred on conflict of interest allegations after it came to light that he had been an independent board member of a private company, Taiwan Mobile, whose vice-chairman and two other company executives sat on the NTU committee to select the university’s president. The ministry under Pan said it was duty bound to ensure the selection was “procedurally sound” before signing the new appointment.

The delay in approving Kuan’s appointment led to accusations that the ministry was interfering in the university’s autonomy and right to select its own president, with rallies held on the NTU campus. University autonomy is a sensitive topic for NTU, which saw political interference in academia with many of its professors and students suppressed during Taiwan’s post-war martial law era that ended in 1987.

Higher education laws were amended in 1993 to allow an internal selection committee within a university to elect its own president.

There was also wider criticism that the education minister was withholding approval for political reasons as Kuan had served as a minister for Taiwan’s National Development Council under the previous Kuomintang (nationalist) led government. The Kuomintang is currently in opposition.

The ruling DPP’s opposition to Kuan also became an issue in some local elections held in Taiwan on 24 November, in which the ruling party suffered heavy losses.

Taiwan’s ministry of justice in late March also announced that the Taipei District Prosecutor’s Office had opened an investigation into whether Kuan violated laws barring government officials and former government officials from taking up jobs in China within three years of leaving office, after it came to light that Kuan had been a visiting professor in China.

Deep divisions

Kuan in March accused the government of making false accusations about him and slammed the ministry for delaying his NTU appointment, which he said undermined the operations of NTU. The university subsequently became deeply divided into pro-Kuan and anti-Kuan factions.

Former president of National Dong Hwa University, Wu Maw-Kuen, took over as the new education minister from 17 April after Pan’s resignation, unable to break the deadlock. Wu served only 41 days as minister before also resigning after failing to resolve the NTU debacle – he had asked the university to repeat the selection process, but this was rejected by NTU.

The poisoned chalice was handed to Yeh in May, who became the latest education minister to resign but with Kuan finally approved. The ministry has said Kuan takes up his post on 8 January 2019.

Yeh said the ministry had asked NTU to conduct a “complete review” of the “flaws and disputes” that emerged during the process of electing a new president and submit a report on this and on corrective measures to the ministry within three months.