Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi may be on the verge of opening a Pandora's box in his drive to pursue government reforms.
Today he will launch a special panel in the Cabinet Office to single out government-affiliated corporations for intense scrutiny. If studies find them too unprofitable or simply unnecessary, the panel will determine whether to abolish them, privatize them or integrate them with other corporations.
These 163 state-linked corporations were either established or endorsed by special laws to operate public services, such as Japan Highway Public Corp., which operates the nation's expressways. Many of them are unprofitable and laden with huge amounts of debt or nonperforming loans.