TOKYO -- The fundraising scandal that has sent support for Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's cabinet plummeting harks back to the Recruit bribery scandal that brought down a government in 1989.
That was a year of great upheaval. January brought the death of Emperor Hirohito and the start of the Heisei era. The consumption tax was introduced in April, followed in June by Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita's resignation. His successor, Sosuke Uno, was rocked by a sex scandal and was undone by his party's heavy losses in a July upper house election. Toshiki Kaifu took over in August.
