Japan Press Weekly

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2017 December 20 - 2018 January 9 [SOCIAL ISSUES]

Right-wing hotelier works for victory of anti-constitution candidates in general election

Japan’s well-known hotel chain owned by an ultra-right-wing revisionist, during the October general election campaign, sent its client companies a letter calling for support of Liberal Democratic Party candidates and other anti-constitution candidates, Akahata on December 25 reported.

Motoya Toshio is the CEO at APA Hotels and Resorts and was a vice head of a supporters’ group of PM Abe. In January, Motoya had his book denying the Nanjing Massacre placed in APA hotel guest rooms, provoking fierce criticism from inside and outside Japan.

The APA Group which contains the hotel chain in January 2013 established the APA Corporate Club, a friendship network of the group’s client companies. Motoya took on the position of honorary chairperson. A senior advisor to one of Japan’s major construction companies Kumagai Gumi assumed the post of the club chair. As of October, the number of member companies stands at 856 which includes major corporations such as Shiseido, Suntory, and Panasonic.

According to Akahata, in the October general election, the APA Corporate Club endorsed 48 pro-constitutional revision candidates of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Tokyo governor’s Party of Hope such as former Defense Minister and Abe’s close ally Inada Tomomi and former Education Minister Shimomura Hakubun. The club sent member companies a letter asking for support for the 48 candidates with the candidate list attached.

The letter stated that the 48 candidates have the “right idea on which way Japan should take” and the “right historical view”. It also stated that they would make an important contribution to Motoya’s own organization seeking to change the pacifist Constitution.

Following the victory of 47 of the 48 candidates in the general election, APA sent the friendship network members a letter of appreciation which states that the movement for constitutional amendment took a big step forward as the general election produced a large force of constitutional revisionists occupying two thirds of parliamentary seats.

The APA group owner in 2011 founded a rightist organization with the aim of eliminating a so-called “masochistic view” of Japan’s past war and reviving Japan as a country to be proud of. He routinely organizes lecture meetings by inviting those who glorify Japan’s past war of aggression, including former chief of staff of the Japanese Air Self-Defense Force Tamogami Toshio, as speakers.

Past related article:
> Major Japanese hotel chain puts books denying Nanjing-Massacre in its rooms [January 30, 2017]