Photo/Illutration Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his wife, Akie, have their photos taken with participants at the April 13 cherry blossom viewing event at Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Nov. 20 admitted his involvement in the process of selecting guests for the annual state-financed cherry blossom viewing event amid growing allegations that he has used the event for personal gain.

Abe’s remarks at the Diet contradicted what he had previously said and cast serious doubt over the credibility of his claims.

Fresh allegations and questions about the event have emerged almost daily.

Abe should accept opposition demand for intensive Budget Committee sessions and disclose all the facts concerning the issues raised.

Previously, Abe said he was not involved in deciding who should be invited to the gathering held at Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden in central Tokyo.

In a Nov. 20 Upper House plenary session, however, Abe admitted that he had known that his office was inviting a wide range of people to take part in the event.

”I also gave my opinion (about who should be invited) when consulted by office staff,” he said.

Abe defended his previous comment by saying he meant he had not been involved in the final decision on the list of the guests and claiming what he initially said was not a “false answer” as opposition parties called it. But who would take his words at face value?

After he first denied his involvement in the process, it was revealed that his office had distributed notices about tours featuring the event to local voters in his electoral district. This may have forced Abe to change his answer.

The Abe administration has a history of stonewalling demands for the truth and only trickling out accurate information when it had no choice. Abe’s responses are as insincere as the way his administration has handled various scandals in the past.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga on Nov. 20 provided a breakdown of how recommendations for invitations were doled out. Abe recommended about 1,000 of the 15,000 or so invitees, while around 6,000 invitees were recommended by people with ties to the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, Suga said.

Shoji Onishi, a councilor in the Cabinet Secretariat, said Akie Abe also made recommendations.

When he was asked about his wife’s alleged involvement in the scandal over the dubious sale of state-owned land to Moritomo Gakuen, an Osaka-based school operator linked to the first lady, Abe defended her by saying she is a “private individual.”

Akie Abe’s involvement in the process of selecting the guests despite her being a “private individual” has only reinforced the argument that Abe has used the event for his personal interests.

Abe’s comments about the party held the night before the cherry blossom viewing, which was organized by his support group in Yamaguchi Prefecture, are also hard to believe. Abe says the 5,000-yen ($46.16) fee for the party at a luxury Tokyo hotel, which opposition parties say is too low, was set by the hotel. But no document to back his claim has been shown.

While he acknowledged that the bash was organized by his own support group, Abe’s political funding report does not refer to the group’s payment to the hotel on the grounds that the money was paid by the participants directly to the hotel. This is behavior that effectively eviscerates the spirit of the Political Funds Control Law, which is designed to inject transparency into the flow of political funds.

It has also been disclosed that in January, the LDP sent invitations to its Upper House lawmakers who planned to seek re-election in July telling them they could invite up to four groups of people, such as supporters, to the cherry blossom viewing event.

In Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture, which constitutes a large part of Abe’s electoral district, only LDP members of the municipal assembly were allegedly invited to attend the cherry blossom event together with their friends and acquaintances.

If the event was effectively used for the ruling party’s efforts to win elections, it was egregious contempt for the integrity of the tax-funded event.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Nov. 21