Japanese Foreign Minister Seiji Maehara has decided to resign after opposition parties piled pressure on him over a donation scandal, local media reported yesterday.
In a blow to the center-left government, it had emerged that Maehara — widely seen as a potential successor to Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan — had received a donation from a foreign resident of Japan, in violation of the law.
Maehara apologized on Friday for taking at least ￥50,000 (US$610) from the woman, a Korean descendant, whom he said he had known since childhood.
Public broadcaster NHK said Maehara was meeting Kan yesterday evening at the prime minister’s official residence to offer the prime minister his resignation.
Maehara then rejected a plea from the prime minister to stay in his post after offering his resignation, according to Kyodo news agency.
Maehara’s resignation would be a blow to Kan and his governing Democratic Party as the prime minister fights to keep his own job and avoid calling a snap election while trying to enact budget bills in a divided parliament.
“A foreign minister is at the forefront of negotiations with foreign countries. If a person in that post has taken donations from foreign nationals, resignation is unavoidable,” Yosuke Takagi, acting secretary-general of the New Komeito Party, said in a televised debate.
New Komeito is the second-largest opposition party behind the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).
Hirofumi Nakasone, head of the LDP’s upper house caucus, joined Takagi by saying at another TV debate program that Maehara should “take responsibility” for the problematic donations.
Maehara said on Friday that he had accepted donations from a Korean resident of Japan, but said he had done so unknowingly. Taking political donations from foreign nationals is illegal if done intentionally.
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