Yoshiko Sakurai analyzes the abnormal SNS opposition to the Prosecutors Office Act amendment, the extension of Prosecutor Kurokawa’s retirement age, personnel dynamics within the prosecution, and the reporting posture of the Asahi Shimbun and NHK, while exposing the contradictions of media figures and celebrities who regard being “anti-power” as justice.

May 23, 2020
Needless to say, regarding China’s actions around the Senkaku Islands, and also regarding the present Wuhan virus calamity, I have never heard them raise a voice of “No” against China.
The following is from Yoshiko Sakurai’s regular column, which closes this week’s issue of Shukan Shincho, published under the title, “The Prosecutors Office Act and the True Nature of Abnormal SNS Public Opinion.”
This article, too, proves that she is a “national treasure” as defined by Saicho.
At the same time, it also proves how utterly foolish, contemptible, and indeed equivalent to “traitors to the nation,” the exact opposite of “national treasures,” are the celebrities who, pretending to have a sense of justice, posted opposition to the extension of prosecutors’ retirement age.
They seem to stand on the position that being anti-power is justice, but needless to say, regarding China’s actions around the Senkaku Islands, and also regarding the present Wuhan virus calamity, I have never heard them raise a voice of “No” against China.
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The movement surrounding the bill to amend the Prosecutors Office Act, which would raise the retirement age of prosecutors, developed rapidly.
On May 18, at the Prime Minister’s Office, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe gave up on passing it in the current Diet session and said the following.
“We cannot move forward without the understanding of the people,” and “The secretary-general and I agreed that in reforming the public servant system, it is indispensable to listen carefully to the voices of the people.”
In an interview before the Prime Minister’s press conference, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said, “We have no choice but to carry it over to the next Diet session as continued deliberation. The extension of Mr. Kurokawa’s retirement age and the issue of extending the retirement age of prosecutors as a whole have been strangely linked, and at present an objective discussion is not possible.”
Certainly, the fact that the retirement age of Hiromu Kurokawa, prosecutor general of the Tokyo High Public Prosecutors Office, was extended by six months at the end of January this year, and the fact that the retirement age of prosecutors as a whole would be extended in the same way as that of other national public servants, must be considered separately, but the two matters have become mixed together, making the discussion difficult to understand.
On Friday night, the 15th, Prime Minister Abe said the following on Genron TV, an internet broadcast that I host.
“The Ministry of Justice, including the Public Prosecutors Office, brought the personnel proposal. We, the Cabinet, approved it,” and “Regarding personnel affairs of the Public Prosecutors Office, this was the collective will including the top of the prosecution. They brought a proposal to proceed with such personnel affairs. We have generally approved it as it is.”
Many people, including former prosecutors general who raised voices against the amendment of the Prosecutors Office Act this time, argue that there is a “custom” in which the Cabinet basically respects the intentions of the prosecution and the Ministry of Justice regarding personnel affairs.
Prime Minister Abe has said that the current Cabinet also respects the longstanding custom, and there should be no problem.
To begin with, the issue of extending the retirement age of prosecutors had been discussed for quite some time.
Takashi Yamashita, who served as Minister of Justice from October 2018 to September 2019, recalled the following.
“During my time as well, there was talk that the general National Public Service Act would apply to the extension of prosecutors’ retirement age. Since the Prosecutors Office Act has no provision concerning the extension of prosecutors’ retirement age, I myself thought there was no problem in applying the National Public Service Act to the missing part.”
Because Kurokawa is “pro-Abe”
The Ministry of Justice began discussing the extension of prosecutors’ retirement age around the time Yamashita assumed office as justice minister, near the end of 2018.
Following the National Personnel Authority’s recommendation in August of that year concerning raising the retirement age of national public servants, the Cabinet Office asked the Ministry of Justice to compile an internal opinion on the relationship with the retirement age of prosecutors prescribed by the Prosecutors Office Act, and after discussions in the Criminal Affairs Bureau of the Ministry of Justice, an internal document was compiled on January 16, 2020, stating that “the application of the retirement-age extension system under the National Public Service Act is not excluded for prosecutors.”
The next day, the 17th, the administrative vice minister of the Ministry of Justice sought the approval of Justice Minister Masako Mori, and Mori gave verbal approval.
On the 21st, the Cabinet Legislation Bureau, and on the 24th, the National Personnel Authority approved the Ministry of Justice’s judgment.
In this compilation, the Ministry of Justice organized its legal interpretation concerning the extension of prosecutors’ retirement age, and within the ministry it formulated a personnel proposal to extend by six months the retirement age of Kurokawa, the prosecutor general of the Tokyo High Public Prosecutors Office, an official appointed with Imperial attestation.
On January 29, Mori requested a Cabinet decision, and it was formally decided at the Cabinet meeting on the 31st.
The Asahi Shimbun was quick to treat this matter as a problem.
It reported, in substance, that “political will” had operated behind the orderly procedures by which the retirement age of a prosecutor was extended, something that had never happened before.
Even if, for the sake of argument, “politics” had “expressed its will,” those who make that claim say the reason for political intervention is that Kurokawa is “pro-Abe.”
However, as prosecutor general of the Tokyo High Public Prosecutors Office, Kurokawa in effect directed the investigation of the bribery case surrounding integrated resorts, IR, and arrested a sitting Diet member, Tsukasa Akimoto, for the first time in about ten years.
He also questioned a parliamentary vice-minister of justice in connection with the same case.
Both were a major shock and an image blow to the Abe administration.
The claim that Kurokawa is “close to Prime Minister Abe or the Abe administration” is not persuasive.
Then did the Public Prosecutors Office side think of extending Kurokawa’s retirement age?
Looking at the career histories of successive prosecutors general of the Tokyo High Public Prosecutors Office, it is clear that this post leads to the position of prosecutor general.
The term as high prosecutor general ranges from about six months to about two years, but of the ten high prosecutors general before Kurokawa, six became prosecutor general, and prosecutors general generally retire voluntarily within about two years of assuming office.
The current Prosecutor General Nobuo Inada took office on July 25, 2018, and on July 24 this year he will have served exactly two years.
If Inada voluntarily retires at that point, then by custom there is a high possibility that Kurokawa, whose retirement age was extended by six months, will become prosecutor general.
At that time, another candidate for prosecutor general from the same class as Kurokawa, Makoto Hayashi, prosecutor general of the Nagoya High Public Prosecutors Office, will turn 63 on July 30 and reach retirement age.
But if Kurokawa does not become prosecutor general through the retirement-age extension, then there is also a strong possibility that Hayashi will become prosecutor general.
An abnormal “struggle” is underway
Because of the circumstances described above, one could also see in the background of this issue a power struggle within the prosecution, for example a struggle between the Kurokawa faction and the Hayashi faction.
Or there may be a desire to preserve talent for the next generation of prosecutors general.
Then, a bill to extend the retirement age of all national public servants, including prosecutors, was submitted to the Diet.
The issue became even harder to understand, and opposition to the bill rose abnormally through the reporting of the media, including the Asahi Shimbun and NHK.
There were also reports that posts with the hashtag had reached five million.
For some reason, NHK even reported in a way that, through analysis, gave the impression that this was not manipulation by a specific small number of people.
I truly feel that an abnormal “struggle” is underway.
On the 15th, former Prosecutor General Kunihiro Matsuo, 77, and others also submitted an opinion opposing the bill to the Ministry of Justice.
It was a protest by legal experts, but there are strange points.
Regarding Prime Minister Abe’s statement at the House of Representatives plenary session on February 13 that “we have decided to change the traditional interpretation so that the National Public Service Act also applies to prosecutors,” Matsuo and others said that it “evokes the ghostly medieval words said to have been spoken by Louis XIV, who established and ruled over France’s absolute monarchy: ‘I am the state,’” and criticized it as “containing a danger that could lead to the denial of the principle of separation of powers, a basic principle of the modern state.”
If they are serious, are their senses not considerably out of alignment?
With the rigid idea that legal interpretation must never be changed, it would be impossible to deal with reality.
Also, prosecutors are administrative officials among general-service national public servants, and the authority to appoint and dismiss high prosecutors general belongs to the Cabinet.
It is not an issue of separation of powers.
Matsuo and others also claim that there is an “established custom that politics does not intervene in prosecutors’ personnel affairs.”
It is natural that the independence of prosecutors is important.
However, if the prosecution, which possesses powerful authority, were to carry out personnel affairs arbitrarily and refuse to accept the Cabinet’s views, that would itself be the problem.
The authority of appointment and dismissal belongs to the Cabinet.
The very argument that seems to forget this, to use Matsuo’s old-fashioned expression in the style of “I am the state,” could lead to “prosecutorial fascism,” could it not?
Which side, the ruling party or the opposition, will be able to conduct a calm discussion in the next Diet session?
I want to watch closely, including the movements of former prosecutors and SNS public opinion.