Photo/Illutration Education minister Masahito Moriyama answers questions during a Lower House Budget Committee session on Feb. 6. (Koichi Ueda)

As the Cabinet minister with jurisdiction over religious corporations, education minister Masahito Moriyama has sought the disbandment of the Unification Church.

Given the authority and responsibility his position entails, Moriyama’s relationship with the Unification Church needed to be squeaky clean.

But that does not appear to have been the case.

For the sake of conducting a fair assessment of the situation, we must conclude that Moriyama is no longer fit to remain in office.

It has come to light that during the 2021 Lower House election campaign, Moriyama received a “letter of endorsement” and campaign support from the Federation for World Peace, an affiliate of the Unification Church, now formally called the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification.

Suspicion has also arisen that Moriyama and the federation exchanged a “Confirmation of Recommendations,” a de facto policy agreement.

Two days before the campaign officially kicked off, Moriyama reportedly received the letter of endorsement while attending a “national policy briefing event” hosted by the federation. During the campaign, federation members reportedly made phone calls to voters, urging them to vote for Moriyama, and provided updates to Moriyama’s office as needed.

But in response to an examination by the Liberal Democratic Party in 2022, Moriyama only reported that he had given a short speech at a meeting held by the federation about five months after his 2021 election victory, and he did not mention anything about the election campaign.

And at the time of assuming the post of education minister last autumn, he did not say anything about the campaign, either.

During a questioning session in the Diet on Feb. 6, Moriyama explained he could neither confirm nor recall anything clearly. He obviously wants to keep the past under wraps, which can only further erode the public’s trust in the government.

After the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in July 2022, the Unification Church and some LDP lawmakers were found to have exchanged “Confirmation of Recommendations” letters regarding election campaign support.

While the impact of these letters on LDP policies has yet to be determined, they showed LDP legislators pledging to proceed with constitutional revision while moving cautiously on the matter of legitimizing same-sex marriage.

Also included in the letters were the lawmakers’ promises to work on the establishment of a “law to support education at home” and a “basic law for the sound development of youth,” both of which were being promoted by the Unification Church.

This should be taken seriously since these are education-related laws, and the education minister’s perception and understanding of the issues concerned ought to be scrutinized.

Concerning the call for the dissolution of the Unification Church, the Tokyo District Court is scheduled to hear the opinions of both the government and the church starting on Feb. 22.

But we seriously doubt the success of the hearings, given that Moriyama obviously “owes” a lot to the Unification Church.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s responsibility is extremely heavy for having appointed Moriyama to the Cabinet. However, Kishida merely repeated in the Diet that “the ties will be severed in the future,” and defended Moriyama’s refusal to resign.

But now that the reality has come to light--something that was still unknown at the time of Moriyama’s appointment--there is absolutely no justification for Kishida to just let this matter go.

And it has become too clear how slipshod the LDP’s “examination” was.

The church is believed to have asked dozens of LDP lawmakers to sign “Confirmation of Recommendations” letters.

Unless the party conducts a thorough examination now, its unresolved relationship with the Unification Church will come back to haunt it forever.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Feb. 7

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