Japan Press Weekly

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2011 October 5 - 11 [NUCLEAR CRISIS]

Murky ties between Saga governor and power company

There exist suspicions that Kyushu Electric Power Company (Kyuden) has donated a large amount of money to Saga Prefecture-promoted projects, such as the construction of a medical facility, in return for acceptance of pluthermal power generation, and that Saga Governor Furukawa Yasushi has utilized these donations to promote his policies.

A cancer treatment center is now under construction at a site near newly opened Shin-Tosu Station on the Kyushu Shinkansen bullet train line (Tosu City in Saga Prefecture).

Governor Furukawa aggressively pushed ahead with the project which was the key policy issue in the 2007 gubernatorial election. The prefectural government subsidized the construction project with 2 billion yen, and Kyuden made a donation of about 4 billion yen to the 15 billion yen-project. Local residents said that Kyuden’s donation was “the reward money for the introduction of pluthermal power generation.”

Japanese Communist Party Saga Prefectural Committee secretary Imada Masato said, “The original location where the governor intended to construct the center was Karatsu City.”

Karatsu City is located next to a municipality hosting the Kyuden’s Genkai Nuclear Power Plant. Some villages and towns that are part of the city were opposing the pluthermal plan.

Furukawa apparently tried to stifle objections by building the treatment center.

However, because Karatsu City has poor access to transportation, Tosu City with a station on the Kyushu Shinkansen line was chosen as the site for construction. To compensate, the governor actively assisted a move to open a branch of a famous private junior-and-senior high school in Karatsu City. When the prefectural government faced difficulty obtaining funding for the establishment of the school, Kyuden gave 2 billion yen to assist.

Kyuden also contributed 500 million yen to the prefecture for operating another public facility which is scheduled to open in downtown Karatsu City.

Japanese Communist Party member of the Saga Prefectural Assembly Muto Akemi said, “Kyuden has played a major role in providing financial support for the governor’s policies and optimized the influence of the governor in order to promote nuclear power generation. The governor has no right or qualification to make decisions regarding nuclear energy administration.”

Political fund reports released by one of Governor Furukawa’s political fund-managing bodies show that between 2005 and 2009, the body received 495,000 yen in donations from Kyuden executives. Furukawa has held fund-raising parties twice since he took office. Kyuden admitted that it purchased tickets both times.