In a revelation likely to rekindle criticism of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, media reports Tuesday suggested that one of his then-executive assistants said in a 2015 meeting that the prime minister was directly behind a bid by an Okayama school chain to win government approval for a new university department in a special deregulation zone.
The daily Asahi Shimbun ran a front-page article featuring a photocopy of a document it said was written by municipal officials from Ehime Prefecture detailing the exchange with Tadao Yanase — Abe's former secretary — in April 2015. Yanase has repeatedly denied having attended such a meeting.
The memo quoted Yanase as describing the bid by Kake Gakuen — which is chaired by Abe's longtime confidant Kotaro Kake — to win government approval to open a new veterinary department at one of its universities as "the prime minister's matter."