Local Tax Act

The provisions of Articles 436, 437 and 441 through 445 of the Civil Code apply mutatis mutandis to the obligation to jointly and severally pay or remit local government levies.

Taxpayers are jointly and severally liable to pay local government levies on property in co-ownership, property in common use, joint business, articles produced by joint business, or joint acts.

Co-owners, joint users, joint business operators or persons engaged in a joint act who are special collection agents are jointly and severally liable to remit local government levies relating to property in co-ownership, property in common use, joint business or joint acts.

Where the legal manager of a business is a mere nominal holder and it is found that a relative of that manager or another individual specified by Cabinet Order as having a special relationship with that manager (hereinafter in this paragraph referred to as a "relative, etc.") actually manages that business, for the purpose of the application of the preceding paragraph, that manager and that relative, etc. are deemed to be joint business operators.

Where a judgment invalidating a merger or company split (hereinafter in this Article referred to as a "merger, etc.") has become final and binding, the juridical persons that carried out that merger, etc. are jointly and severally liable to pay or remit the local government levies of the juridical person surviving the merger, the juridical person established by the merger, or the juridical person that succeeded to the business through the company split, for which the obligation to pay or remit arose on or after the day of that merger, etc.

Where a juridical person has carried out a company split (excluding a split-off-type company split prescribed in Article 2, item (xii)-10 of the Corporation Tax Act (Act No. 34 of 1965); the same applies hereinafter in this Article), the juridical person that succeeded to the business through that company split (referred to as the "successor corporation in a company split" in Article 14-9, paragraph (1), item (vii)) is jointly and severally liable to pay or remit the following local taxes of the juridical person that carried out that company split (including the demand fees, delinquency charges, additional charges for understatement, additional charges for failure to file, substantial additional charges and expenses for the delinquent tax collection procedure relating to those local taxes, and excluding those for which the obligation to pay or remit has been succeeded to by the juridical person that succeeded to the rights and obligations as trustee under Article 9-4, paragraph (4) and those for which the obligation to pay or remit becomes an obligation covered only by the trust property (meaning an obligation covered only by the trust property prescribed in Article 154 of the Trust Act; the same applies in Article 17-2, paragraph (1))); provided, however, that this is limited to the value of the property succeeded to from the juridical person that carried out that company split (excluding property belonging to the trust property succeeded to from the juridical person that carried out that company split):

local taxes for which the obligation to pay or remit arose before the day of the company split (excluding the prefectural tobacco tax and the municipal tobacco tax collected by the method of filing and payment under Articles 74-9 and 472 (referred to as "tobacco tax paid by filing" in the following item));

tobacco tax paid by filing for which the obligation to pay arose by the last day of the month preceding the month that includes the day of the company split.

With regard to the application of the provisions of paragraph (1) to the ordinary tax imposed under Article 4, paragraph (3) (hereinafter referred to as the "prefectural non-statutory ordinary tax"), the ordinary tax imposed under Article 5, paragraph (3) (hereinafter referred to as the "municipal non-statutory ordinary tax"), or the earmarked tax imposed under Article 4, paragraph (6) or Article 5, paragraph (7) (hereinafter referred to as the "non-statutory earmarked tax"), that the local government specifies by its Prefectural or Municipal Ordinance as one for which it is difficult to follow the provisions of paragraph (1), the phrase "before the day of the company split" in paragraph (1), item (i) is deemed to be replaced with "up to a day before the day of the company split that is specified by Prefectural or Municipal Ordinance of the local government".