Friday, July 11, 2014

‘A Crisis in Japan’ ~public broadcasting company subverts democracy




 Nearly 1,000 people gathered for an event in Osaka on June 21 to demand that the chairperson and two board members of Japan’s public broadcasting company NHK resign for making controversial remarks.
 MOMII Katsuto expressed at his first press conference as an NHK chairperson that war-time brothels existed in every country, not only Japan, and his political gaffs continued flowing every so often since. HYAKUTA Naoki, a board member and a popular novelist, claimed that countries around the world ignored the Chinese propaganda that Japanese troops carried out a massacre in Nanjing.
 Professor Emeritus of Tokyo University DAIGO Satoshi pointed out at the event that it is abnormal for a public television station to only release news as an implemental body for Prime Minister Abe's administration.
 IKEDA Eriko, a former director, and NAGATA Kozo, a former chief producer--both of NHK--made a report on complications that ABE Shinzo (chief cabinet secretary at the time) applied pressure on NHK in 2001 to revise its documentary on comfort women.
 SAKAGUCHI Norio, a lawyer, talked about a legality of a concrete measure to suspend fee payment for NHK viewers because the company is failing to observe its code of ethics. He remarked that only citizens' power could help set NHK straight and laid out a framework of a legal team.
 (By NAGATA Kozo, Musashi University professor)


 
6 21日、大 阪・中之島公会堂で、「どうする!公共放送の危機」621関西集会が開かれました。小糠雨が降る中、会場には950人が結集し、NHK籾井会長、百田尚 樹・長谷川三千子経営委員の罷免を求めました。醍醐聡東大名誉教授は、三氏の問題発言だけでなく、安倍政権の道具と化したNHKニュースの異常さを指摘。 池田恵 理子・永田浩三の元NHKディレクターは、ETV2001番組改変事件とその後の放送現場の変化について報告しました。阪口徳雄弁護士は、NHKの受信料 の一時停止や保留の正当性と弁護団の体制について語りました。(報告:レイバーネット会員 武蔵大学教授 永田浩三)

No comments: