Nagasaki governor received 20 million yen in donations from companies

Thirty-three contract companies involved in the reclamation project in Isahaya Bay have donated more than 20 million yen (about 150 thousand dollars) to Kaneko Genjiro, Nagasaki Prefecture governor.

This was revealed by Fudesaka Hideyo, Economic Policy chair of the Japanese Communist Party, at a news conference on January 11 in Nagasaki City. He was in Nagasaki to join with the progressive candidate for Nagasaki prefecture governor, Akira Takamura.

As a gubernatorial election is scheduled for February 3, whether to stop or allow the Isahaya Bay reclamation to continue is a major election issue.

Explaining why the agriculture ministry and the prefectural government have been so eager to go ahead with this wasteful reclamation project, JCP Fudesaka said that they are under the spell of the politic-bureaucratic-corporate collusion.

Fudesaka said that Nagasaki governor Kaneko, who is running for the election, has received a total of 22.37 million yen during the past five years from 33 corporations involved in the Isahaya-related project.

The reclamation was resumed by ignoring the demands of fishermen and ordinary citizens for preserving Japan's biggest tidal land of Isahaya, calling for the rebirth of Ariake Bay to which Isahaya belongs.

Corporate donations connected to public undertakings mean diverting taxpayers' money allotted for the project to the governor, said the JCP lawmaker.

At least 33 agriculture ministry officials have taken posts at these corporations after their retirement, he said, and called on the people to give a heavy blow to such corrupted politics through their votes in the upcoming gubernatorial election in Nagasaki. (end)