Prosecutors on Tuesday searched locations related to two ruling Liberal Democratic Party factions — including the largest — as Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s administration continues to be plagued by a spiraling political funds scandal.
The Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office’s special investigation squad searched the biggest faction, once led by late Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and another led by former LDP Secretary-General Toshihiro Nikai.
They are attempting to build cases against accountants from the factions, alleging the groups failed to declare hundreds of millions of yen of fundraising party revenue in political funding reports, with the money going to faction members, sources said.
The shady funds are believed to have amounted to about ¥500 million ($3.5 million) over a five-year period through 2022 for the Abe faction and also over ¥100 million for the Nikai group, they said.
The scandal has pushed Kishida to replace all four ministers belonging to the faction once led by Abe. His Cabinet’s support rate has plummeted to a fresh low of 22.3% in the latest survey by Kyodo News.
LDP factions have traditionally set quotas for lawmakers on the sale of party tickets, usually priced at ¥20,000. In some groups, if targets are surpassed, the extra funds have been passed back to them as a type of commission.
In the Abe faction, those funds have not been logged as either expenditure or revenue in reports coming from the faction or lawmakers’ side, in a potential violation of the political funds control law.
Questioning of the faction’s lawmakers has already begun on a voluntary basis.