A senior government official with close ties to Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga resigned Tuesday after being reprimanded over a wining and dining scandal that involved other officials and companies that they supervise.
The resignation of Yasuhiko Taniwaki, who played a pivotal role in fulfilling Suga's policy pledge of lowering mobile phone fees, came along with a decision by the communications ministry to suspend him from work for three months.
Taniwaki, who had been touted as a candidate for vice minister, the top post for bureaucrats at the ministry, was found to have violated the ethics code for central government officials by receiving lavish dinners from telecom giant Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp.