Groups demand action over MRI accident

ACCOUNTABILITY:
Paying compensation to people and the president’s commendation of Lin Shu-ya do not compensate for the lack of criminal proceedings, protesters said

• By Shih Hsiao-kuang and Jonathan Chin / Staff reporter, with staff writer

Members and groups of the Control Yuan yesterday demanded responsibility for the fall of the crane boom onto the tracks of the Taichung Mass Rapid Transit System (MRT) during a protest at the doorstep of the National Human Rights Commission last year, causing an accident in which a woman died in Taipei.

The protest marked the first anniversary of the incident in which a train crashed into the overturned crane, killing legal scholar and indigenous rights advocate Lin Shu-ya (林淑雅) and injuring 10 others.

A coalition of 20 groups including the Taiwan Association for Human Rights and Control Yuan members Yeh Yi-jin (葉宜津), Tien Chiu-chin (田秋堇), Kao Yung-cheng (高涌誠), Yeh Ta-hua (葉大華) and Pasuya Poiconx co-hosted the event.

In the year after the disaster, none of the people involved in the engineering project that placed the crane have been punished and the crucial Transportation Safety Board (TSB) investigation report has not yet been released, protest organizers said in a statement.

Multiple official investigations by the Control Yuan, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Taichung city government, as well as the TSB’s preliminary report, have pointed to human error as the cause of the incident, it said.

The reports found errors, inadequate safety precautions, poor communication and dereliction of duty by OSHA, the Taichung Urban Development Bureau and the Taichung Mass Rapid Transit Corp, they said, adding that the Control Yuan had issued a corrective action over the crash .

Taichung city government officials should be held accountable for failing to supervise project contractor Highwealth Construction Co – the company responsible for building the site from which the crane boom fell. However, this did not happen, they said.

Paying compensation to the victims and Lin’s family members does not compensate for the lack of criminal proceedings against those responsible, organizers said.

The disaster was not an isolated case of misfortune but underscored the country’s systematic failure to take necessary measures and the need for comprehensive reforms in public works, they said.

Government agencies and private companies should not be allowed to outsource their public safety responsibilities or liability to subcontractors, organizers said.

Too often, subcontractors are blamed for workplace incidents while government agencies and companies shirk their duty to prevent accidents, it said.

President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) posthumous recognition of Lin Shu-ya is no substitute for justice and accountability, they added.