<figure id="attachment_349580" class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 1280px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-349580"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="64c63999"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2023/12/538462e1c9cf14f9d9e881ca3626b737.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-349580" class="wp-caption-text">The Seiwa Kai Party.</figcaption></figure>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> Back&#8221; and &#8220;Buck.&#8221;</span></p>
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<p>The Seiwa Seisaku Kenkyukai (Abe faction) is the largest faction of the LDP. It is said that a quota for the sale of political fund party tickets was set according to the position and number of times a member was elected, and the excess amount was kicked back, and the amount returned was called so.</p>
<p>The House of Councillors members of the Abe faction have their own rule that the quota is eliminated in election years, but the House of Representatives members have a quota even in election years, and it seems that not a few members were suffering from this.</p>
<p>Regarding the return of a total of over 500 million yen, a mid-level Diet member, speaking on condition of anonymity, said, &#8220;Only a small number of members received a return.</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> A mid-career councilor, speaking on condition of anonymity, said, &#8220;Chairman Shiotani would call me and say, &#8216;Fatty, please,&#8217; and he would tell me one way or the other. The last three years were relatively easy because the quota was halved in Corona, but every year we couldn&#8217;t meet the quota and had to take out all the money. The upper limit is 10 million yen for experienced chairmen like Mr. Abe and Mr. Hosoda, and the lower limit is said to be 600,000 yen for a first-year student.</span></p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> The reality is that it is not easy for legislators who are close friends of general contractors and the pachinko industry to get by. A former cabinet member who left the Seiwa-kai during his term in office also stated, &#8220;I never reached the 5 million yen mark, and all I did was take money out of my pocket.</span></p>
<p>The amount of money paid to a person who has served as chairman of the Seiwa-kai seems high, at 10 million yen,</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> However, the amount of money paid to a former chairman may seem high at 10 million yen, but &#8220;when you are the leader of a faction, you hold power and people and money come to you. If you become chief cabinet secretary or secretary-general, you can get out of the LDP&#8217;s secret funds and money,&#8221; he said.</span></p>
<p>He said. On the other hand, local elected officials have no access to people or money, and their party ticket sales at a Minato Ward hotel in a local city were limited. Several people were heard to say that they had to pay out of their own pockets every year.</p>
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<div data-friday-nextpage-lead="Shocking! The &quot;quota amount&quot; imposed on each council member"></div>
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<p>There will be some margin of error as we proceed with the interview, but the following figures are likely to be used for the quotas that have been set.</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent">　Experienced chairpersons 10 million yen</span><br>
<span class="strongInContent">　Chairperson, Chief Advisor 7.5 million yen</span><br>
<span class="strongInContent">　Experienced cabinet members 5 million yen, 6 million yen</span><br>
<span class="strongInContent">　Ordinary members of the Diet: 600,000 yen to approximately 2 million yen</span></p>
<p>The &#8220;back&#8221; amount sold in excess of the quota has been operated in such a way that it is returned by the faction in the form of an incentive payment. This &#8220;reversal&#8221; has also occurred in other factions, but the Abe faction is the subject of an investigation by the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office because both the faction and the legislators failed to record the &#8220;reversal&#8221; in their income and expenditure reports.</p>
<p>The fact that the &#8220;return&#8221; was not recorded on the reports of both the Abe faction and its members makes it impossible to know how the money was used. The investigation is currently underway with a view to filing a case against Abe for violating the Political Funds Control Law (failure to record information and making false statements), which is against the transparency of political funds.</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> The faction side had stopped me from writing down the amount, saying, &#8216;You don&#8217;t have to write it down under &#8220;income of political organizations&#8221; because it&#8217;s a policy activity expense. Because of the strict quotas, the extra money was kept at the office in case the quotas rose as he rose in the ranks. The &#8216;return&#8217; is said to be a slush fund, but it is really a savings for the next quota,&#8221; said the councilor.</span></p>
<p>A Diet member who belongs to the Tokyo Metropolitan Federation of Trade Unions commented on the strict quotas.</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> In addition to the quota for factional party tickets, Tokyo Diet members are also forced to pay 2 million yen worth of Tokyo Metropolitan Federation party tickets and 1 million yen worth of Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly members&#8217; party tickets, which have nothing to do with Diet members. Support groups and supporters also have their ups and downs, and they don&#8217;t always buy the tickets.</span></p>
<p>It is likely that there are many complaints, both large and small.</p>
<p>On December 13, former Vice Defense Minister Hiroyuki Miyazawa told the Diet for the first time that he was instructed by his faction not to write anything about it and that his faction told him not to talk about it, thus revealing for the first time the faction-wide cover-up.</p>
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<div data-friday-nextpage-lead="The anger of the Seiwa-kai members was directed at..."></div>
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<p>This confession may be the prelude to the collapse of the largest faction of the 99. The aforementioned councilor, prefacing his remarks with the statement, &#8220;This is not a correct comparison.</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> In the Showa period, the bosses would illegally collect money and distribute it to their henchmen. Nowadays, Seiwakai operates in such a way that it squeezes its henchmen, and they complain to each other, &#8216;Is this the Yamaguchigumi (which is known for imposing strict fines on its affiliated groups)?</span></p>
<p>After the extraordinary session of the Diet was closed, the Tokyo District Public Prosecutor&#8217;s Office gathered experienced backup prosecutors and clerks from all over the country to form a 50-unit team to interview Diet members as well. Even before that, they had been conducting investigations targeting Abe&#8217;s accounting staff and secretaries. Former Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori (86) is believed to have been involved in the creation of the &#8220;return&#8221; scheme.</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> In September, Mr. Mori was injured in a fall at his home, suffering a compression fracture to his spine and was hospitalized. His kidney function also deteriorated, and he was confined to a wheelchair when he went out. His wife&#8217;s eyesight also deteriorated, and in November they moved to a nursing home in the city center. It seems that she sent letters to those close to her saying that she had entered her final days and that she would miss seeing them as she had in the past.</span></p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> However, it is a high-class nursing home, and outsiders are shut out, but residents are free to come and go as they please; on December 5, he had dinner at a high-class Japanese restaurant in the Valles Hotel, and the following day on December 6 at a high-class steak restaurant in Shinbashi, and on December 11, he came to singer Shinji Tanimura&#8217;s farewell party in his wheelchair.</span></p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> Even after his retirement, he continued to meddle in factional management and showed even more influence after Mr. Abe&#8217;s death. He was the chairman of the organizing committee for the Tokyo Olympics and got away with it while receiving 2 million in sympathy money from sponsor companies and making several arrests in the Olympics corruption case. This time, too, it was only himself &#8230;&#8230;&#8221; (the same legislator).</span></p>
<p>The lawmakers, many of whom are &#8220;back&#8221; within the Abe faction, are being arbitrarily interviewed by the Special Investigation Department. Is it a coincidence that Mori entered the nursing home at this time?</p>
<figure id="attachment_349581" class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 1280px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-349581"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="424db406"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2023/12/9506b6e6fa9d1df086cc22bb05e40773.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-349581" class="wp-caption-text">Post in the building that houses the Seiwa-kai</figcaption></figure>
<figure id="attachment_349582" class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 1280px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-349582"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="1697748d"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2023/12/2389c92123223939138c8f4d7c46bb00.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-349582" class="wp-caption-text">A mailbox in the building where the Seiwa-kai is located</figcaption></figure>
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 Daisuke Iwasaki

 The allegation of money behind the par ticket is directed at lawmakers who belonged to the Seiwa Seisaku Kenkyukai, the largest faction of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). The reality is that the money was close to donations to senior lawmakers, and many lawmakers were struggling to meet their quotas. A reporter from this magazine uncovers the details.

The &#8220;per-ticket quota&#8221; imposed on LDP Abe faction lawmakers, &#8220;just like the Yamaguchigumi&#8221;&#8230; Shocking inside information leaked by a former cabinet member.

The “per-ticket quota” imposed on LDP Abe faction lawmakers, “just like the Yamaguchigumi”… Shocking inside information leaked by a former cabinet member.

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