Doubts have emerged in the ruling coalition over the government’s fervent pursuit of integrated resorts, including casinos, amid a bribery scandal that has further damaged the image of legalized gambling in Japan.

The Abe administration, which has long touted integrated resort projects as a pillar of its economic growth strategy, said it will set up a basic policy for such resorts in late January as scheduled.

However, an official of the prime minister’s office suggested there might be a postponement.

“We will see how the Diet goes,” the official said on Jan. 20, the day the ordinary Diet session opened.

The same official had earlier played down any negative impact from bribery scandal on the administration’s integrated resort policy.

“We need to make a decision as soon as possible. Otherwise, local municipalities presenting bids to host integrated resort projects won’t be able to start the specific work,” he had said.

Opposition parties are doing their part to not only delay the basic policy but also to scrap the entire idea.

They jointly submitted legislation to the Diet on Jan. 20 to repeal the integrated resort implementation bill that was passed in July 2018.

“We don’t need casinos in Japan,” Jun Azumi, chairman of the Diet Affairs Committee of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, told reporters. “We will make full efforts to enact the legislation and stop the implementation of (integrated resort projects).”

The land ministry by the end of this month is scheduled to draw up the basic policy to set forth criteria for authorizing such resort projects and selecting locations for development.

Essentially, it will serve as the basis for evaluating plans submitted by local governments to attract integrated resort projects.

However, the Dec. 25 arrest of Lower House member Tsukasa Akimoto on suspicion of taking bribes from a Chinese company has rocked the administration and dampened enthusiasm for opening the integrated resort projects in the mid-2020s as planned.

Akimoto was a member of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party when he was arrested. The Chinese company, which had been seeking an investment opportunity in the casino business in Japan, is believed to have given bribes to Akimoto in exchange for favors when he was vice minister of the Cabinet Office and oversaw integrated resort projects.

The company was also found to have sent money to other lawmakers of the LDP and Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party), which has promoted policies related to integrated resort projects.

Since Akimoto’s arrest, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga has reiterated that the administration will move forward with the plan as scheduled.

The government set up a commission at the Cabinet Office on Jan. 7 to manage casino-centered resort projects. Also in January, the government mapped out a blueprint for determining the basic policy and to encourage local governments to draw up concrete plans.

But the negative views on casinos expressed in multiple public opinion polls and growing criticism from opposition parties have put pressure on Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his administration.

Opposition parties have long criticized the integrated resort plan, but the LDP, including Akimoto, steamrolled related bills to legalize casinos in Japan.

“It was Prime Minister Abe who appointed (Akimoto) as vice minister of the Cabinet Office to oversee integrated resort projects,” Kazuo Shii, chairman of the Japanese Communist Party, said at a news conference. “We will hold (Abe) directly accountable.”

Komeito, the junior coalition partner of the LDP, has been treading lightly around the issue. Opposition to integrated resort projects has been strong among members of the party’s core support organization, Soka Gakkai.

“We cannot just stick with the schedule and say, ‘OK, let’s implement it,’” a Komeito official said.

A delay in a decision over the basic policy would affect the local governments’ schedule.

If the decision is put off, it would not be the first time for the Abe administration to push back the deadline for the basic policy.

The administration initially planned to release an outline of the basic policy last summer, but it decided to postpone it until September to avoid any impact from the issue on the Upper House election held in July.

(This article was written by Ryo Aibara, Takahiro Okubo and Shinobu Konno.)