Japan Press Weekly

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2015 January 28 - February 3 [SOCIAL ISSUES]

NHK shows increasing tendency to put voluntary restraint on programs critical of government policies

One year has passed since Prime Minister Abe Shinzo appointed his friend Momii Katsuto, a special advisor to Nihon Unysys, Ltd., to be the president of Japan’s public broadcaster, NHK. More and more NHK workers have voiced their concern about the increase of a repressive atmosphere in the company, Akahata reported on January 31.

After assuming NHK leadership, Momii in his first press conference made the remark that comfort women systems are common for any country in time of war and that NHK could not independently say “left” when the government says “right”. His remarks provoked controversy even among NHK workers and led them to hold a rally in protest. However, it fell short of growing into a strong protest movement.

Some NHK directors and producers said that they will exercise self-restraint when submitting ideas for programs dealing with political subjects. This reveals that the company is pressuring them to be quiet about politically sensitive matters, they added.

A trigger for the existing repressive atmosphere may be an incident that happened in 2001 after the public broadcaster televised a program focusing on the comfort women issue.

At that time, it was revealed that with pressure from Abe Shinzo, who was serving as deputy chief cabinet secretary, contents of the aired program had been drastically changed from the original one. Following the revelation, citizens filed a lawsuit against Abe’s use of his influence on the TV program. In 2005, a person in charge of producing the program blew the whistle on the company for being heavily under political influence.

Since the incident occurred, at NHK, it is said that proposals for programs critical of government policies and depicting Japan’s war responsibility and other historical issues are routinely dismissed. “Those in managerial positions display a tendency to be sensitive about reactions from the government. Front-line workers are aware of this tendency and as a result, a structure imposing voluntary curbs on programming has been established,” an NHK producer said.

In addition to Momii, his two predecessors were business leaders who also have close ties with Abe.

Complaining about the current situation, an NHK worker said, “What most NHK executives fear is Prime Minister Abe behind the NHK president, with NHK actually playing the role as a state-run broadcaster.”

This worker went on to say, “Most NHK staff sincerely think that a public broadcaster should speak for the ordinary people. Individual workers’ voice is weak, but we have a union.” Another worker with a managerial job said, “When thinking about ways to establish trust with the general public, we need to train our journalistic mindset as a public broadcast network reporting objectively when dealing with political and social issues.”

Past related articles:
> NHK refuses to air comedians’ political jokes [January 15, 2015]
> 1,527 former NHK employees stand up to oust Momii as president [August 22, 2014]
> NHK union questions board’s ethics of public broadcasting [March 20, 2014]