2009 November 3 - 10 [
POLITICS]
How Cabinet Secretariat’s ‘state secret funds’ are used
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November 8, 2009
Japanese Communist Party Policy Commission Chair Koike Akira on a TV debate program aired on November 7 demanded that the Democratic Party of Japan-led government give out the details of “state secret funds” managed by the Cabinet Secretariat.
The amount of funds in question is about 1.4 billion yen a year or four million yen a day in tax money which cabinet secretaries can freely use with no requirement of attaching receipts. Successive governments have used the funds without revealing how they were used.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirano Hirofumi once tried to deflect criticism by putting on a bold face and saying, “What is it? I have no idea what you’re talking about. (Sep.17)” However, he later made it clear that the government does not reveal usages of such funds. Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio also says that the government will not respond to this issue.
Referring to this, Koike pointed out that the DPJ in 2001, when Hatoyama was its head, had submitted to the Diet a bill to require state secret funds to be made public and that even during one-on-one debates with then Prime Minister Koizumi Jun’ichiro, Hatoyama had repeatedly demanded full disclosure of these controversial funds.
The question of secret funds was first brought to light under the Cabinet of Prime Minister Mori Yoshiro in 2001. At that time, documents that instruct incoming cabinet secretaries on how to use the secret funds and on procedures to be followed when cabinets change were revealed. According to the documents, persons close to the prime minister distribute money from the secret funds to opposition parties when the government wants to pass particular bills through the Diet. Despite these evidentiary materials, past governments have denied the existence of the secret funds.
- Akahata, November 8, 2009
