Apr 26 07:06 AM US/Eastern
(AP) - TOKYO, April 26 (Kyodo) — A prosecution inquest committee said Monday it has decided that the decision by prosecutors not to indict Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama over false funds reporting by his political bodies from 2004 to 2008 was appropriate.
The citizen panel said, however, that more than a few members questioned Hatoyama's petition submitted to the prosecutors that he did not know anything about the false reporting or the around 1.25 billion yen his mother provided for his political activities between 2002 and 2009.
The panel of 11 citizens selected by lottery reached the decision last Wednesday in closed-door consultations following a complaint filed by a citizens group against the prosecutors' earlier decision not to indict the prime minister.
It is the first such decision made with regard to an incumbent prime minister.
"I will take everything solemnly," Hatoyama told reporters in the evening. "I can't comment on it either as a member of the government or as the direct party (involved in the case)."
The panel said it reached the decision as all of the statements given by those involved in the case consistently said that no one related to the case apart from a former state secretary of the prime minister had knowledge of the false reporting of the funds and that the prime minister was not involved in the scheme.
The panel also said it could not find any reason why the prime minister would deliberately take part in such a scheme.
The decision came after the Tokyo District Court's decision Thursday to sentence Keiji Katsuba, 59, the former state-financed secretary of Hatoyama, to two years in prison, suspended for three years, for falsifying political funds reports at the prime minister's fund management and political bodies.
In the political funds scandal that embroiled the prime minister, who is facing sagging approval ratings and an upper house election this summer, Hatoyama himself was not indicted due to a lack of evidence of his involvement. But prosecutors indicted without arrest another former secretary who has already been fined 300,000 yen in the case.
Regarding Hatoyama's petition, the panel said, "Considering public sentiment in general, it is hard to imagine" that Hatoyama did not know about the false reporting or the huge amount of funds given by his mother.
Some of its members argued the petition contained simply the prime minister's "own opinions" and that the lack of any investigation of Hatoyama by prosecutors raises questions about the contents of the petition, it said.
Although the panel concluded that Hatoyama should not be held responsible for picking and overseeing the former secretary as a chief accounting manager, some on the panel claimed the Political Funds Control Law should be revised to toughen its rules as it currently favors politicians and runs counter to common sense.
Under the current law, politicians are held criminally responsible only when they are found to have neglected both choosing and overseeing their political group's accounting manager properly.
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