Pachinko Business Leaders Buy Employees’ Votes

The investigation team of Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department and other prefectural police offices arrested six managers of pachinko business with suspicion of violating Public Offices Election Act. They are suspected to have paid their employees reward on voting for specific candidate in the Upper House election in July, who were supposed to represent interest of their business. The candidate was on the slate of leading Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). 

Pachinko, or upright pinball, is a form of gamble in Japan. Players get prize from pachinko parlor and there are dealers around the parlor who exchange those prizes into cash. About 67 hundred pachinko parlors are in Japan, which annual sales amount 15 trillion yen. It is estimated that 80 percent of pachinko halls are run by Korean-Japanese or their descendants.

 

Lee Changbeom, the president of Derupara Group with nationality of South Korea, and other managers are arrested with suspicion of having paid cash to over 250 of their employees in exchange of voting for an LDP candidate in proportional district, Yasuhisa Abe, in the Upper House election on July 20th. As the chief of union for pachinko parlors, Abe ran for the election, with official endorsement of the LDP, for the first time as the representative from pachinko businesses.

 

It is not unusual for a candidate representing specific interest of an industry or an organization. While the LDP fields candidates from organizations such as local post offices or medical doctors, the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDPJ) and the Democratic Party for the People (DPP) has candidates from labor unions. The organizations seek promoting their own policies through those lawmakers and the parties expect votes from those organizations in the election.

 

The managers of Derupara are doubted as distributing 3 to 4 thousand yen to each of at least 60 employees in early and mid-July, asking votes for Abe. Although Abe obtained 88 thousand votes in the election, he lost in 20th position in the roster of 31 LDP proportional candidates. The LDP significantly lost its seats in the Upper House, securing only 12 seats in the proportional district. The twelfth candidate received 132 thousand votes, 44 thousand more than Abe.

 

Pachinko business is in a slump these years. In the 1990s, there were 17 thousand pachinko parlors in Japan. With regulation by police to prevent addiction to gambles, pachinko business declined, replaced by other gambles including internet casino. The pachinko industry hoped to raise status of their business through policies to promote pachinko as a culture in Japan. However, the ambition was blocked by decline of the LDP, on which pachinko business relied.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dilemma between Alliance and Constitution

  In the new year ministerial online meeting, Japan and United States resolved to work together to deal with various challenges by China. In the Joint Statement of the Security Consultative Committee, or “2+2,” the ministers of both government, US Secretaries of State and Defense and Japanese Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Defense, expressed their concerns on Beijing’s efforts, which were recognized as undermining the rule-based order in Indo-Pacific region and the world. On possible countermeasures, however, there still is a possibility of constitutional dispute in Japan over the principle of exclusively defensive security policy. The ministers referred to their concern about China’s activities in the East and the West China Sea. They reaffirmed to apply Article V of US-Japan Treaty of mutual Cooperation and Security to the Senkaku Islands, and strongly objected to China’s unlawful maritime claims, militarization and coercive activities in the South China Sea. They did not forge...
Read more

Oral Argument against Landfill

Governor of Okinawa Denny Tamaki made an unusual appearance to the court on Monday to submit his opinion on the building of new base for United States Force in Henoko, Nago city. “Execution by proxy of the national government, which violates the independency of Okinawa, cannot be accepted,” said Tamaki in the first oral argument at Naha Branch of Fukuoka High Court on the trial over the request of national government to change the design of new base. Accepting demand from Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, the court closed the trial on the day one.   The national government submitted in 2020 a change of plan for the construction of new base, which was to reinforce the soil of sea base. The government of Okinawa rejected the plan and Tokyo ordered Okinawa accepting it, but Okinawa did not obey, and then Tokyo filed a lawsuit. The Supreme Court decided in September that the order of national government was lawful. Seeing that Okinawa did not approve the plan by ...
Read more

New But Traditional Capitalism

According to the top leader of Japan, the country is going to lead the world with a concept of “new capitalism.” In his annual policy speech to the National Diet on Monday, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida required the people to join his challenge for economic and social change, to which he believed the world to be stepping forward. However, his challenge looks to be relatively leaning on traditional growth-oriented policies, lacking strong momentum for wealth distribution to every corner of Japanese society.      Kishida tried to sell his new capitalism as the key to economic revitalization. He listed various hazards the world was encountering; wider gap and poverty brought by dependence on market economy without fair distribution, shortage of mid- or long-term investment caused by putting priority on efficiency of competitive market, losing sustainability, arial gap between the urban and the rural, serious climate change with pressure on the nature, and crisis of healthy de...
Read more