The Fukuoka District Court ordered Kitakyushu Mayor Koichi Sueyoshi and 70 other city officials Thursday to reimburse 13.4 million yen in public funds that were spent on "business meals" by local officials in fiscal 1995.
In the rare ruling warning against excessive spending of taxpayers' money for bureaucrats' meals, Judge Hiroshi Koga said a payment of over 5,000 yen per person per meal can constitute an abuse of the right to use taxpayers' money.
The suit was filed in 1998 by 45 citizens, including members of a local civic ombudsman group. The civic group claimed the defendants in the city spent too much money on 229 occasions in fiscal 1995.
They demanded that the mayor and the 70 officials pay back 25 million yen, which was the total amount of the meals. Of the amount, the district court ordered the bureaucrats to reimburse what they spent in excess of 5,000 yen per person per meal.