Japan Press Weekly

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2013 January 30 - February 5 [POLITICS]

PM Abe accepts money from construction firms

Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, who is increasing the budgets for large public works projects, received political donations from construction firms in his hometown of Yamaguchi, Akahata reported on February 3. Many of the firms obtained contracts from local and national governments.

The Liberal Democratic Party branch in the 4th electoral district of Yamaguchi Prefecture headed by Abe collected donations of more than 10 million yen from 22 local construction companies during the period between 2009 and 2011, according to its political funds report.

The amount of the contributions per company ranges from 60,000 to 720,000 yen a year. The majority of them make the same amount of donation every year.

Many of the companies have been awarded public works contracts with the national government and local municipalities.

Copros Co. Ltd., one of the firms in Shimonoseki City, donated a total of 720,000 yen in three years, and was contracted for improvement works of national roads for around 400 million yen from a construction ministry’s regional bureau. Ube Kogyo Co. Ltd. (Ube City), which made the largest donation of 1.2 million yen in total, won contracts of road repair works, worth 614.8 million yen, from the bureau.

While accepting donations from construction firms, the prime minister is increasing funding for public works projects that benefit the construction industry. His attitude toward the use of political donations should be examined.