November 24, 2012

The amount of the state’s post-disaster reconstruction budget diverted into projects unrelated to reconstruction is as much as 2 trillion yen, which could be used to distribute 10 million yen each to 200,000 houses needed to be repaired in areas affected by the massive earthquake and subsequent tsunami on March 11, 2011.

The budget diversion was decided at a closed-door negotiation by the Democratic, Liberal Democratic, and Komei parties.

A typical example of the diversion was a 300 billion yen subsidy to post-disaster recovery of the private sector. Toyota, Canon, Panasonic, and other major corporations have received 80% of the subsidies for their projects outside the disaster-hit areas. Only 20% of the total amount was provided to disaster-affected prefectures.

The Japanese Communist Party revealed the diverted subsidy and was the only party that opposed the third supplementary budget.

JCP Lower House member Sasaki Kensho during a Diet deliberation in March demanded a water reheating function be added to bathtubs in temporary housing facilities for disaster victims. Pointing out that only 15 to 20 billion yen is needed in order to accomplish this, Sasaki criticized the government for diverting 44 billion yen of the recovery budget into the purchase of new transport aircraft for the Self-Defense Forces.

Past related articles
>80% of disaster-recovery fund given to major firms [October 19, 2012]