Fukushiro Nukaga, who stepped down from his post last week as minister of economic and fiscal policy, announced Tuesday his intention to explain his involvement with the scandal-tainted mutual aid organization KSD at a political ethics council.

"I will make clear the facts at a session of the Council on Political Ethics and prove myself innocent," Nukaga told senior members of the Liberal Democratic Party at a faction meeting.

He said he will take the proper procedures to convene the council after the Diet opens today.

Nukaga admitted that his secretary received 15 million yen in cash on two occasions from KSD, a Tokyo-based insurer for small businesses, although he said the money was returned to the insurer after the scandal broke.

Meanwhile, former Health and Welfare Minister Junichiro Koizumi further urged Nukaga to testify before a Diet committee whose sessions are open to the public.

"When a politician is suspected of committing wrongdoings he should do whatever he can to clear his name, including testifying before the Diet," Koizumi told a lecture meeting Tuesday.

On the same day, opposition forces adopted a resolution, saying they will demand Nukaga and Masakuni Murakami, a key member of the ruling LDP, to testify before a Diet committee, and not just the political ethics council, to make clear the facts.

Since the council is closed to the public and no penalty given for false testimony, the four opposition forces claim that Nukaga and Murakami should explain their ties with KSD at the Diet committee as well.

"It's time our four opposition parties join hands in the Diet," said Takako Doi, head of the Social Democratic Party. "I would like to call the incoming session the KSD session."

Added Kazuo Shii, presidium chairman of the Japanese Communist Party: "We must not stop investigating (the scandals) after questioning the individuals concerned. Let us move into the core of (Prime Minister) Yoshiro Mori's LDP and attack it until it breaks down."

Yukio Hatoyama, leader of the Democratic Party of Japan, said he never imagined that the Institute of Technologists, a planned engineering school supported by a KSD affiliate, was a private college. The school is due to open in April in Gyoda, Saitama Prefecture.

Citing Article 89 of the Constitution that prohibits extending subsidies to private institutions, Hatoyama said, "Why did the (then) Labor Ministry directly provide subsidies (to the college)? Wasn't it a violation of the Constitution?"