Scandal over political donations dogs Japan’s education minister

Hakubun Shimomura, the Japanese education minister and the man tasked with instilling "moral education" in the nation's youth, is becoming embroiled in a scandal allegedly involving shady political donations and Japan's underworld.

A minister since 2012 and a close ideological ally of PM Shinzo Abe, Shimomura and his finances have come under the scrutiny of Japanese media after similar red flags were raised over four other cabinet colleagues.

Two of those ministers, appointed after Abe won the general election in December, were quick to resign, although Shimomura and the government appear to be trying to ride this scandal out, said Jake Adelstein, author of Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan and an expert on Japan's underworld groups.

"Shimomura has a great story he has used to further his political career," Adelstein said. "His father died when he was a child and he suffered great hardship, he wrote in his autobiography, working all through school until he started his own cram school.

"He also said that he built up his cram school business so he could afford to be a politician and change the education system in Japan, and one would think that would mean creating better schools and further education opportunities and so on," he added. "But all he seems to have done is to help the operators of other cram schools, which is a huge business in Japan."

The allegations of financial impropriety were first reported in Shukan Bunshun magazine, which claimed Shimomura had received illegal political funds, including from Masahiro Toyokawa, a cram school owner with extensive links to the Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest underworld group, Adelstein said.