Prosecutors in Kaohsiung have charged seven people with lying under oath to protect a former city council speaker already convicted of pocketing public money — bad news for anyone hoping the case would quietly end.

• Tseng Li-yen, former Kaohsiung city council speaker and a KMT member, has been sentenced to 12 years in two courts for fraudulently claiming assistant expenses.
• Six of her assistants told the court her staff salaries were handed over in cash envelopes; prosecutors say that was false, and the money actually came from her spouse or a company.
• Two of those men were never really her assistants and never drew a salary at all.
• A seventh man is accused of acting as a fake assistant on paper, lending his bank account and PIN so council subsidy money could be withdrawn and used by Tseng.

Outlook: The perjury charges keep the corruption case alive and could harden the outcome as it moves toward a final ruling.