Tokyo: The ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s political reform task force includes members suspected of creating slush funds through fundraising events in a high-profile political funds scandal involving LDP factions, party sources said Saturday.

The task force, headed by Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, also president of the LDP, is slated to draw up specific reform measures to restore public trust in the wake of the scandal, but opposition parties could question its legitimacy.

Speaking to reporters at the prime minister’s office on Saturday, Kishida stressed that he does not intend to exclude the members in question from the task force because of the suspicions. “We will discuss the matter with the whole party and reach a conclusion that will help restore public trust,” he said.

A mid-ranking member of the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan argued that the LDP task force could be a “slush fund cover-up task force.”

The 38-member task force includes 10 lawmakers from the LDP’s largest faction, once led by the late Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and now at the center of the scandal.

According to the party sources, the task force members were selected with an emphasis on balance among party factions. Whether member candidates were suspected of involvement in the scandal was not taken into account.

The possibility of some task force members facing allegations “had been factored in,” a party official said.

The LDP task force held its first meeting on Thursday and plans to release an interim report by the end of this month, preparing for attacks from the opposition camp during an ordinary parliamentary session that begins later this month.

JIJI Press