TOKYO: Japanese public prosecutors are planning not to indict seven senior members of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s biggest faction over a high-profile political funds scandal, people familiar with the investigation said Tuesday.

Investigators from the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office apparently concluded that there is no enough evidence to prove the guilt of the seven lawmakers in the LDP faction previously led by the late former Prime Minister ABE Shinzo.

The seven are former education minister SHIONOYA Ryu, former LDP policy chief SHIMOMURA Hakubun, former Chief Cabinet Secretary MATSUNO Hirokazu, former industry minister NISHIMURA Yasutoshi, former LDP parliamentary affairs chief TAKAGI Tsuyoshi, SEKO Hiroshige, former secretary-general for LDP lawmakers in the House of Councillors, and former LDP policy head HAGIUDA Koichi.

According to people familiar with the matter, the Abe faction set sales quotas for fundraising party tickets for member lawmakers. Revenues in excess of the quotas were kicked back to the lawmakers, with such money allegedly turned into slush funds and not included in their political funds reports in violation of the political funds control law.

In addition, 10 or more Abe faction lawmakers are suspected of creating slush funds by not giving the excess revenues to the faction. Such funds were also not included in their fund reports.

Nearly 600 million yen in slush funds may have been generated through such practices at the Abe faction in 2018-2022, a period for which the statute of limitations for failing to record funds or making false statements in political funds reports still stands.

The seven senior Abe faction members have denied their involvement in failing to report such funds in their reports, during voluntary questionings with investigators from the prosecutors’ office.

The prosecutors’ office is planning to indict an official in charge of accounting at the Abe faction without arrest.

The office also plans to prosecute two other Abe faction members–Upper House member Yasutada Ono and House of Representatives member Yaichi Tanigawa, who allegedly received about 50 million yen and over 40 million yen in kickbacks, respectively.

Among other Abe faction members, Lower House member Yoshitaka Ikeda was arrested on Jan. 7 on suspicion of failing to report 48 million yen in kickbacks from the faction. He was expelled from the LDP after the arrest.

JIJI Press