Photo/Illutration Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba responds to a question in the Lower House Budget Committee on Dec. 5. (Takeshi Iwashita)

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba rejected an opposition proposal to ban political donations from companies, saying such a move would infringe on their freedom of expression.

Ishiba on Dec. 5 appeared at the Lower House Budget Committee for the first time since taking office in October.

Yoshihiko Noda, head of the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, urged the prime minister to work toward revising the Political Fund Control Law before year-end to ban donations from companies and organizations.

But Ishiba responded that donations were one way for companies to express their views, and he suggested that rather than imposing a total ban, the better move would be to disclose all donations.

In response to a question from the opposition Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party), Ishiba said he had no recollection of corporate donations distorting policy.

The revision proposal put together by Ishiba’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party has no provision banning donations from companies and organizations.

Noda also pressed Ishiba to undertake another investigation into the large amounts of unreported money collected by LDP factions through fund-raising parties and distributed back to faction members.

But the prime minister said there was no such need since no new facts had emerged.

Opposition party lawmakers pointed to discrepancies between what Diet members have said about such funds and what was divulged in the court sessions that led to convictions of violating the Political Fund Control Law.

The suspects, who were in charge of accounting for two former LDP factions, were accused of failing to list all revenues and expenditures in the factions’ political fund reports.

The opposition lawmakers demanded that those in charge of accounting be called to testify as unsworn witnesses before the Diet.

Jun Azumi, the CDP lawmaker who now chairs the Lower House Budget Committee, told reporters that committee directors met, but no agreement was reached on summoning the unsworn witnesses because LDP members were opposed.

However, Azumi pledged to hold further discussions about such a move rather than simply ignore the opposition demand.

That is a major change from the past, when LDP members chaired the Budget Committee. The LDP was forced to hand over the important post to the CDP after the ruling coalition failed to retain its majority in the October Lower House election.

During the Dec. 5 committee session, Azumi said discussions would be conducted expediently among directors over the unsworn witness request.

In the past, LDP chairs often said the matter would be taken up later, but, more often than not, no such discussions were held because the ruling coalition held a majority of the director posts.

Azumi is the first opposition lawmaker to chair the Lower House Budget Committee in 30 years.

(This article was compiled from reports by Shinichi Fujiwara, Kei Kobayashi and Takahiro Okubo.)

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