Inquest Sought in Prosecutor Decision over Document Tampering

June 6, 2018

Osaka- A group of citizens filed a petition with an Osaka prosecution inquest panel on Tuesday to review prosecutors' decision not to indict former and current Ministry of Finance officials involved in the manipulation of official documents related to a controversial sale of state land.

"I want to leave a decision to members of the inquest panel, who are lay people," Hiroshi Kamiwaki, professor of Kobe Gakuin University, told a press conference in Osaka, western Japan.

"I hope the whole truth will be eventually revealed in open court," said Kamiwaki, who, along with lawyers, brought accusations over the scandal.

Late last month, the special investigation squad of the Osaka District Public Prosecutors Office decided not to indict 38 former and current MOF officials, including Nobuhisa Sagawa, then head of the Financial Bureau, citing insufficient evidence.

The petition argues that former and current MOF officials should be indicted, saying deleting sections from the official documents on the land sale, including parts mentioning Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's wife, Akie, amounts to a crime.

Officials of the ministry's Kinki Local Finance Bureau also committed a breach of trust by causing damage to the government through the unreasonable discount sale of a state-owned plot in Toyonaka, Osaka, western Japan, to school operator Moritomo Gakuen, the petition said.

Akie Abe was once named honorary principal of an elementary school Moritomo Gakuen planned to open on the land plot.

Lawyer Tokuo Sakaguchi said at the press conference, "The Moritomo scandal remains shrouded in mystery." He added that he believes the top level of prosecutors voluntarily tried not to cause trouble for the government by deciding not to indict the officials involved. Jiji Press