Police arrested six executives of a Tokyo-based company operating pachinko pinball parlors on Tuesday, including its 50-year-old president with South Korean citizenship, for allegedly promising to pay a cash reward in return for voting for a certain candidate in the July 20 Upper House election.

Among the other five arrested by the joint investigation headquarters formed by the police departments of eight prefectures, including Tokyo¡¯s Metropolitan Police Department, are Kazuyuki Yuasa, 46, head of the marketing department of the company, Derupara; and Tomoyuki Konishi, 44, chief of Derupara¡¯s management department.

The arrestees are suspected of promising in early to mid-July to pay ?3,000 ($20) or ?4,000 to each of some 60 people, including pachinko parlor workers, in exchange for voting for a proportional representation candidate officially endorsed by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in the July 20 House of Councilors election. Their act allegedly violated the political funds control law.

The investigation headquarters has not revealed whether the suspects admitted to the allegations. It believes that more than 250 employees, including those at Derupara group companies, were involved in the incident.

According to the Tokyo police, the Derupara president and other suspects requested voting for the candidate, Yasuhisa Abe, the 66-year-old head of a national association of operators of pachinko parlors, in the Upper House election.

Specifically, the Derupara president informed, through Yuasa and Konishi, managers of pachinko parlors, including shops run by group companies, on July 2 and 3 that a reward would be paid in the name of overtime if an image of a ballot with the name of Abe on it was sent to the Derupara headquarters.

Following the explanation, the pachinko parlor managers asked their staff workers to vote for Abe. But it is believed that the reward was not paid.

In the Upper House election, Abe, with about 88,000 votes, was 20th among the LDP¡¯s 31 proportional representation candidates, and was unable to win a seat on the chamber.

Established in 2007, Derupara expanded its operations by acquiring peers including Morinaga, based in Kagoshima Prefecture, according to Derupara¡¯s website.

With a workforce of 542 employees, the Derupara group operates a total of 31 pachinko parlors in Tokyo and seven other prefectures ¡ª Ibaraki, Saitama, Kanagawa, Tottori, Okayama, Yamaguchi and Kagoshima.