TOKYO, April 10 (Xinhua) -- A secretary of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe allegedly informed local officials that a project to open a veterinary school in Ehime Prefecture is a "matter concerning the prime minister," local accounts said Tuesday, citing a document on the matter.
According to Kyodo News, senior officials from the prefecture said they found the document on a visit to Abe's office in 2015.
The prefecture, however, officially denies the existence of the document, in contrast to recent sources' version of events.
The Asahi Shimbun daily reported that the document makes reference to Abe's secretary at the time, Tadao Yanase, describing the opening of the school as a "matter related to the prime minister."
Yanase has denied making the comment, adding that he does not remember such a meeting with the local officials.
The Asahi Shimbun daily also reported that it had confirmation of a record of talks between Abe's secretary at the time and the officials from the Ehime.
Japan's public broadcaster NHK also said Tuesday that sources had said that such a document had surfaced, implicating Abe in the cronyism scandal.
Ehime Governor Tokihiro Nakamura said in a press briefing on the matter Tuesday following the report by the Asahi Shimbun daily that the prefectural government is looking into the matter and will share its findings at the earliest possible juncture.
The veterinary school, which opened last week in western Japan, is run by Kake Educational Institution.
Abe has close ties with the school's operator, Kotaro Kake, and suspicions have long been circling that Abe used his influence in the government's approval of the newly-opened department at the Okayama University of Science.
The veterinary medicine department is Japan's first to be opened in half a century and is located in a specially deregulated zone in Ehime Prefecture.
The surfacing of the alleged document threatens to put Abe and his administration on even shakier ground.
Along with the reemergence of the unresolved Kake Educational Institution influence-peddling scandal, Abe has also been implicated in a protracted cronyism scandal connected to a nationalist school operator.
