(AP)
Updated: 2007-09-02 14:46

The government has not released an estimate for the number of people affected or amount of money involved, so estimates of the sum in limbo fluctuate widely, between $25 billion and $175 billion.

Hirano has recovered his missing money in a one-time payment, but his case is rare. The agency says it has cleared up only about 40 cases since the scandal erupted.

It's not the first time the agency has been in trouble.

In 2004, a series of scandals led to the arrest of a senior official on bribery charges. A string of agency-run resorts have suffered massive losses. In 2005, the agency disciplined nearly 3,300 staff for various types of misconduct including accepting questionable gifts and money from office suppliers, an agency report shows.

With his job on the line, Abe has promised to rectify the problems within a year and "squeeze out the pus" ahead of the agency's partial privatization by 2010. The agency chief has been fired.

But many remain leery of the agency.

Three years ago it was revealed that many top politicians had skipped their contributions, highlighting concerns over the system's solvency and prompting a growing number of self-employed, students and non-working to stay out of the system altogether.

Pension payment is mandatory for all Japanese from age 20 to 60. An average company employee pays more than 6 percent of a salary and can expect about $1,450 a month after retirement, usually at age 65.

The growing number of nonpayers has pushed the agency to go after them more aggressively. Last year, the agency mailed collection letters to 310,000 nonpayers and seized assets from 12,000 of them. Today the employee pension is covered almost 100 percent but its revenue is decreasing.

Hirano, the ex-deliveryman, was helped by Tomoichi Shibata, a social insurance consultant who calls himself a "pension detective" and says he has helped more than 2,000 pensioners win redress.

"Ideally, my business wouldn't have to exist if the government operated the pension program properly," he said.

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