Taichung mayor sacks 3 officials over African swine fever failures

Taipei, Nov. 6 (CNA) The Taichung City government has dismissed three senior officials for mishandling the city's response to an African swine fever outbreak, Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) told a news conference Thursday.

According to the city government, Agriculture Bureau Director Chang Ching-chang (張敬昌), Environmental Protection Bureau Director Chen Hung-yi (陳宏益), and Taichung City Animal Protection and Health Inspection Office Director Lin Ju-liang (林儒良) were removed from their posts effective immediately for failing to follow central government epidemic prevention guidelines and creating significant risk.

Lu said that following the gradual lifting of restrictions on live pig transport and slaughter, "citizens and industries can begin to return to normal life."

● African swine fever transport, slaughter bans to end midnight Thursday

"The most important task in this prevention effort was to contain the outbreak within the site and prevent the virus from spreading," Lu said, referring to the pig farm in the city's Wuqi District where several dead pigs tested positive for African swine fever on Oct. 21, prompting authorities to ban transport and slaughter of pigs nationwide.

"Taichung and the central government worked completely united to accomplish this mission," the mayor said.

"I am deeply grateful for the central government's guidance and assistance, and at the same time, I thank the many county and city leaders, people's representatives, industry figures and citizens for their concern and encouragement," she added.

Lu said she felt sorry that the city "did not perform well enough" in its African swine fever prevention work and that, as mayor, she "must take full responsibility and should apologize."

"'Mom' did not do well and must also review and make improvements," she said, referring to herself.

"Taichung is a progressive city striving to improve -- we must do better to be worthy of everyone's support and love over the past seven years."

She said personnel changes had been made and the city's internal investigation into the outbreak was being accelerated, with results to be made public once completed.

Lu said she would "absolutely" take the incident as a "lesson."

Councilor Wang Li-jen (王立任), convener of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus in the Taichung City Council, accused Lu of delaying epidemic prevention work by attending a press event for the city-organized Taichung Shopping Festival.

DPP City Councilor Chiang Chao-kuo (江肇國) alleged that the city government "kept concealing and evading" until the central government intervened.

DPP City Councilor Lin Te-yu (林德宇) said the timing of the two bureau directors' resignations coincided with "Lu's political damage control" and was therefore "very inappropriate."

Meanwhile, Lee Chung (李中), secretary-general of the Kuomintang (KMT) Taichung City Council caucus, said his party respected the mayor's administrative authority and urged the city to learn from the incident.

Lee said the outbreak showed that the relevant departments' early response was "disorganized," adding that dismissing the officials for administrative negligence was an appropriate measure.

The Taichung City Council will invite Lu and department heads to deliver a special report on the African swine fever outbreak on Friday.