Nishimatsu arranged to give 25 mil. yen annually to Ozawa side: sources+

TOKYO, March 5 Kyodo -
Nishimatsu Construction Co. has been arranging to donate about 25 million yen
annually since around 1995 to opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa's office, with the
total amount eventually reaching about 300 million yen over 10 years, sources
familiar with the matter said Thursday.

The midsize construction company worked out a scheme around 1995 to use
political organizations headed by its former employees as dummies for providing
donations to politicians, according to the sources.
Related to the suspicious ties between the Ozawa side and Nishimatsu
Construction, prosecutors arrested Ozawa's secretary, Takanori Okubo, 47, and
two former senior officials of the company earlier this week for violation of
the political funds control law.
The Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office now believes the Ozawa side was
clearly aware, through the company's arrangement, that the donations were from
the company itself, not from the political organizations, according to the
sources.
Under the political funds control law, corporate donations, except for
political parties or their political fund-managing organizations, are
prohibited.
Nishimatsu, meanwhile, gave the donations to the Ozawa side to try and gain
political favor to win contracts for public works projects in the Tohoku
region, Ozawa's political base, the sources said, based on a statement by
Nishimatsu officials to the prosecutors.
Ozawa, leader of the Democratic Party of Japan, is widely regarded as a leading
candidate to be Japan's next prime minister in the event of his party's victory
in the House of Representatives election to be called by this fall.
Through contacts with the Ozawa side, Nishimatsu Construction allegedly agreed
to allocate 15 million yen out of the annual 25 million yen to Ozawa's
political funds management body Rikuzankai, a DPJ branch and the DPJ Iwate
prefectural chapter, the sources said.
Okubo serves as the chief accountant of Rikuzankai.
Nishimatsu Construction provided the remaining 10 million yen to the Ozawa side
through its subcontractors, the sources said.
In a news conference Wednesday, Ozawa denounced prosecutors over the arrest of
Okubo, a state-funded secretary to Ozawa, describing it an ''unfair use of
state or prosecutorial authority.''
In the news conference, Ozawa said he heard that his office received the
donations in question from political organizations, not Nishimatsu, noting that
the political funds control low allows political organizations to provide
donations to politicians.
==Kyodo