Japan Press Weekly

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2013 July 10 - 16 [NUCLEAR CRISIS]

Applicants for restart of NPPs repeatedly make donations to LDP

All of the four power company executives who submitted to the Nuclear Regulation Authority applications for the reactivation of their idled nuclear reactors have repeatedly made political donations to the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.

Strong financial ties between major power companies and the LDP, both seeking the early restart of nuclear power plants, have once again been brought to light.

The four top officials who on July 8 visited the NRA to apply for government approval to reactivate idled reactors are Yoshisako Toru, vice president of Kyusyu Electric Power Co., Tanigawa Susumu, vice director of the nuclear power division at Shikoku Electric Power Co., Morinaka Ikuo, deputy director of the nuclear power division at Kansai Electric Power Co. and Sakai Osamu, vice president of Hokkaido Electric Power Co.

During the period between 2007 and 2010, the above mentioned four executives donated to the LDP’s fund management body a total of 800,000 yen or 100,000 - 360,000 yen each, according to its political fund reports.

The top executives of the nine major power companies operating nuclear reactors in 2009 alone contributed a total of 28 million yen to the LDP’s fund-management organization as “private individuals”. However, the amounts of donations are evidently linked to their executive rank. All of the six vice presidents of Tokyo Electric Power Company donated the same amount (240,000 yen). Despite utilities’ denial, some say that the donations are clearly political contributions.

Past related articles
> Utilities’ executives & unions funding two major parties [August 17, 2011]
> N-plant operators’ officials donated 28 million yen to LDP [July 16, 2011]