TOKYO, March 16 (Xinhua) -- A contractor connected to the cut-price sale of state land that has implicated Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in a cronyism scandal said it gave false information on buried waste at the request by the government, local media said Friday.
The contractor said its falsified information on buried waste led to the land being sold at far below its appraisal value.
The waste was buried at the state-owned site in Osaka, that would be sold to nationalist school operator with ties to Abe's wife, Moritomo Gakuen, at just 14 percent of its market value.
The construction company who inspected the waste told Osaka prosecutors that it had falsely declared that garbage was buried at the site deeper than was the actual case.
The company said it gave the false information as the school operator had also demanded it do so.
The removal of the fabricated amount of garbage was subtracted from the land price and the plot sold to Moritomo Gakuen at a huge discount, with the operator planning to build an elementary school there and for Akie Abe to serve as its honorary principal.
After the scandal first came to light in February last year, Akie severed her affiliation with the school and its operator.
Prosecutors were told by the construction company that it had determined the true depth of the buried waste to be three meters.
But at the request of the government and Moritomo falsely changed the depth to 3.8 meters, with the measurement not being confirmed by the local chapter of the Finance Ministry or other officials.
The Board of Audit of Japan subsequently concluded that the "basis of the land discount was insufficient" as there were no materials found to prove the initial claim of waste being buried to a level of 3.8 meters.
Opposition parties staged rallies calling for Abe to step down for his perceived involvement and Finance Minister Taro Aso to resign to account for his ministry knowingly tampering with state documents related to the deal.
Despite the scandal continuing to draw staunch indignation from opposition parties and the public, parliament convened as per normal Friday, as the opposition bloc ended their boycott.
On Thursday, however, it was reported that Aso will not attend a meeting of Group of 20 finance chiefs in Argentina next week but will appear at a parliamentary session over the state document altering scandal.
The Finance Ministry admitted this week that it had deliberately altered documents connected to the cut-price sale of state-owned land to a nationalist school operator with connections to Abe's wife, Akie. Aso has been then under close scrutiny.
Lawmakers will quiz Aso in an Upper House Budget Committee session on Monday, they have said.
Both camps are also planning to summon former National Tax Agency head Nobuhisa Sagawa to the Diet, to be quizzed over allegations he gave false evidence in the Diet while undertaking his duties as chief of the ministry's Financial Bureau.
The Financial Bureau was in charge of the shady land deal.
