June 27, 2011
Akahata “wave motion” column
Hiroshima Telecasting (HTV) broadcast the documentary “First Year of Plutonium” in a 3-part series between 1992 and 1993. The program created a sensation and won the Incentive Award of the Japan Congress of Journalists (JCJ) and the Grand Prize at “The Age of Regionalism Video Festival”.
The program “First Year of Plutonium” covers the first transport of spent nuclear fuel which is high-level radioactive waste from Japan to France as well as when the fuel was transported back from France after plutonium extraction.
After the broadcast, however, Chugoku Electric Power suddenly notified HTV of its withdrawal from the sponsorship. It, reportedly, complained about the third part of the program covering stories of people who were exposed to radiation at or near nuclear power stations.
HTV reacted by removing a director in charge of the program, plus a chief, an assistant chief, and a producer in charge of news reports from their production posts and reassigned them to a sales department.
HTV is said to receive several dozens of millions of yen from the utility’s sponsorship deals. It is no wonder that the personnel reshuffle was implemented.
Hiroshima Telecasting (HTV) broadcast the documentary “First Year of Plutonium” in a 3-part series between 1992 and 1993. The program created a sensation and won the Incentive Award of the Japan Congress of Journalists (JCJ) and the Grand Prize at “The Age of Regionalism Video Festival”.
The program “First Year of Plutonium” covers the first transport of spent nuclear fuel which is high-level radioactive waste from Japan to France as well as when the fuel was transported back from France after plutonium extraction.
After the broadcast, however, Chugoku Electric Power suddenly notified HTV of its withdrawal from the sponsorship. It, reportedly, complained about the third part of the program covering stories of people who were exposed to radiation at or near nuclear power stations.
HTV reacted by removing a director in charge of the program, plus a chief, an assistant chief, and a producer in charge of news reports from their production posts and reassigned them to a sales department.
HTV is said to receive several dozens of millions of yen from the utility’s sponsorship deals. It is no wonder that the personnel reshuffle was implemented.
