The ruling coalition's new proposal on corporate donations to political parties would probably conceal the identities of most donors, according to a recent Kyodo News study.
The research, based on the 2001 official political fund reports submitted by all parliamentarians, indicates that 80 percent of corporate and other institutional donors would be under no obligation to disclose their identities. That is because the proposed rule would raise the minimum amount of donations requiring identity disclosure to 240,000 yen per year from 50,000 yen now.
The proposal, which requires revising the Political Funds Control Law, is not expected to clear the Diet in the current session, which ends Monday, and instead will be carried over to the next session.