Over a half dozen local governments have officially expressed concern with the way Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government has handled revelations that the Finance Ministry deleted information on official documents related to the Moritomo Gakuen scandal, with the ruling party chapters worried about a voter backlash in next year's nationwide prefectural, municipal, and town assembly elections.
As of Monday, seven prefectural and municipal assemblies had passed nonbinding statements of opinion regarding the document-tampering scandal, which involves the heavily discounted sale of state land to the Osaka-based school chain, which had named first lady Akie Abe as honorary principal of a new school it planned to build.
Last week, the Niigata and Tottori prefectural assemblies called investigations into the matter insufficient thus far. They warned that representative democracy was imperiled by the Finance Ministry's decision to delete information in the official documents, including a reference to Akie Abe in which she was quoted by Moritomo chief Yasunori Kagoike as being supportive of the land deal. She has denied any involvement.