Japan: bill submitted to end casino plans

The opposition in Japan has submitted a bill to scrap the casino plans after a bribery scandal involving official lawmakers.

Japan.- Japanese parties introduced on Monday a bill to scrap casino laws. The four major parties that were involved in presenting the bill to the Diet at its first day of a 150-day regular session.

According to Japan Times, the four parties that backed the bill are the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, the Democratic Party for the People, the Japanese Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party.

“We submitted the bill as the first step to make the government give up introducing casinos,” Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan parliamentary affairs head Jun Azumi said. The opposition is aiming to pressure the government and ruling coalition during this parliamentary session to make them scrap the casino plans.

This move comes just a week after the Japanese lawmaker accused of receiving casino bribes, Tusaka Akimoto, received another arrest warrant.

The Tokyo District Public Prosecutor’s Office’s special investigation team said that Akimoto received bribes from the firm 500.com in exchange of publicly speaking in favour of a casino project. The firm was hoping to participate in a casino project in Hokkaido and asked the lawmaker to deliver a speech at a related symposium in Naha.

The initial payment was €4k but after the firm found out that Akimoto would be assigned to the post of Cabinet Office state minister in charge of the push to launch integrated resorts, it raised the number to €16k. The firm also paid the costs of a trip to Shenzhen to visit the head office of the company.