Japan Press Weekly

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2018 March 14 - 20 [POLITICS]

PM Abe's statements to Diet trigger doctoring of 'Moritomo'-related official records

The Finance Ministry's alterations to its documents regarding a state-owned land deal with school corporation "Moritomo Gakuen" obviously stemmed from Prime Minister Abe Shinzo's statements made in February last year to the Diet.

According to the Ministry, it first tampered with the official records in February last year. On March 12, Finance Minister Aso Taro admitted that the Ministry "rewrote" the data in order to conform with responses to questions given to the Diet by Sagawa Nobuhisa, then chief of the Ministry's Financial Bureau, because, Aso said, "There were contradictions between Sagawa's statement and some descriptions written in the documents."

However, it was in March last year when Sagawa falsely responded to Diet questions.

Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Koike Akira at a press conference on March 13 pointed out, "Sagawa in the Diet didn't mention anything about Abe's wife Akie, so why did the Ministry have to erase her name from its documents?"

In fact, the person who responded to Diet questions in February last year was PM Abe himself. He at a Lower House Budget Committee meeting on February 17, 2017 stated twice, "If my wife or I myself were found to be linked, then I would resign as Prime Minister and as a Dietmember."

Given the timing of this statement, the outset of the alteration may have been Abe's response in the Diet, Koike suspects.

In addition to Akie's name, the Finance Ministry deleted from its records all references to the constitutional revisionist and rightist group Japan Conference (Nippon Kaigi) to which both PM Abe and FM Aso belonged.

Koike said, "Why is it that the Ministry needed to include Akie's name and a reference to Nippon Kaigi in the original?", and added he will continue to work to uncover the facts about the "exceptional" treatment given to Moritomo Gakuen.

Past related articles:
> Opposition parties will pursue gov't responsibility for deleting from official records Abe's wife involvement in state-owned land sale to 'Moritomo Gakuen' [March 13, 2018]
> Finance Ministry’s falsification of ‘Moritomo’-related documents sparks public outcry [March 13, 2018]