TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The corruption investigation into former Taiwan Railways Director Zhou Zu-de (周祖德) and project manager Lin Zhao-zheng (林昭正) has concluded with both men walking free.

Zhou and Lin of the Taipei Engineering Division at Taiwan Railways were accused of inflating project costs and providing undue benefits to vendors during their management of an MRT Project. The decision to acquit was taken by the Northern Taiwan Prosecutors' Office due to a lack of substantial evidence.

The Taiwan Railways Administration began the "Taiwan Railways MRT Project (Xinfeng Station Renovation Project, Civil Works), contracted to Kuo Kung Construction, in 2008. In October 2009, the Taipei Engineering Division of Taiwan Railways terminated the contract with Kuo Kung and initiated a bidding process for the project's second phase.

China Times reported that when bidding opened for the second phase of the project, the value of the contract should have been reduced to reflect the work already completed by Kuo Kung. However, the value was not deducted, and Hua Sheng Corporation won the second contract valued at NT$100 million (US$3.13 million).

The architect supervising the Xinfeng Station project, Lu Xinghong (盧星宏), passed no comment on the fact that the construction had been double-valued and so it passed inspection. Taiwan’s Investigation Bureau suspected that this led to Huasheng Construction pocketing NT$5 million in profits.

Reports were made to the prosecutor’s office that Zhou and Lin had inflated project costs for the benefit of Hua Sheng Corporation. The inflation of budgets in the execution of public works is a violation of Taiwan’s Anti-Corruption Act.

In 2020, an investigation was launched, leading to searches and interviews with Zhou, Lin, and others. However, the three-year inquiry concluded by the Northern Taiwan Prosecutors' Office determined that there was not enough evidence to proceed and all charges were dropped.