2017 Was the Year the Deterioration of the Press Was Recognized as a Major Problem
January 30, 2018
The following is an excerpt from an article published in the monthly magazine Hanada by Koichi Hagiuda, a member of the House of Representatives, Executive Acting Secretary-General of the Liberal Democratic Party, and former Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary.
Emphasis in the body of the text, apart from the headings, is mine.
The Kake Affair Is a Case of “Manufactured Suspicions”
More Than Half a Year of Uproar in the Diet
2017 was the year the deterioration of the press was recognized as a major problem.
Particularly conspicuous is the deterioration of newspaper and television reporting, which still exerts considerable influence on the public.
It is natural for politicians to face harsh criticism at times, but that criticism must be based on facts.
Yet in the “Mori-Kake” affair, which received extensive coverage last year, factually inaccurate labeling and manipulation of public perceptions were rampant, and people who had done nothing wrong were portrayed as though they had committed wrongdoing.
Lumping the two cases together under the label “Mori-Kake” is itself unfair.
The Moritomo Gakuen case involves matters, such as land management, that the government and the administration need to review.
But the Kake Gakuen affair is itself a case of “manufactured suspicions.”
I never imagined that the close friendship between Kotaro Kake, chairman of Kake Gakuen, which was opening a new veterinary faculty in Imabari, and Prime Minister Abe would become an issue and cause more than half a year of uproar in the Diet.
Looking back, it is certainly true that the government, myself included, made mistakes in its initial response.
I was Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary at the time.
When the Kake issue was first raised, the opposition’s claims were so far off the mark that we did indeed respond dismissively, thinking, “What on earth are they talking about?”
Looking back now, however, we should have explained more earnestly that there were no grounds for suspicion, addressing not the opposition lawmakers directly in front of us but the public beyond them.
Moreover, the system governing the Kake Gakuen case does not allow us to intervene in the application and approval process and advance matters with some particular intention.
In other words, everyone involved, including private-sector experts, shared the understanding that there was no room for Prime Minister Abe to intervene through personal connections and manipulate the process to favor an acquaintance.
We therefore did not regard as problematic the document referring to the “Prime Minister’s wishes,” which the Asahi Shimbun presented on its front page on May 17, 2017, as though it were “conclusive evidence.”
It had already been reported in April that I was an honorary visiting professor at Chiba Institute of Science, an institution affiliated with Kake Gakuen.
Consequently, when this document emerged, those involved were even joking and laughing, saying, “So the ‘highest levels of the Prime Minister’s Office’ meant Hagiuda after all?”
But not only the opposition—the media, too, distorted the facts.
Based on this document and the testimony about the matter given by Kihei Maekawa, former Administrative Vice Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, they created the impression that these constituted “conclusive evidence that administrative processes had been distorted by pressure from the Prime Minister or by some attempt to anticipate his wishes.”
Of course, there is nothing wrong with the media covering questions raised by opposition lawmakers, or with the opposition raising media reports in the Diet.
But the facts must not be distorted.
Once an issue has been raised, there is a responsibility to report “what our coverage and questioning have established.”
More than ten months have already passed since the first report, but it hardly needs to be said whether the Asahi Shimbun has fulfilled that responsibility.
To this day, no Asahi Shimbun reporter has even come to interview me personally about the documents concerning me.
The Story That “Hagiuda Is Guilty”
At one point, the opposition pursued me so intensely that it demanded I be summoned to testify.
But where do things stand now?
Neither the opposition nor the media has produced new facts or conclusive evidence demonstrating my involvement.
Calls for me to be summoned to testify have also completely disappeared.
Yet there are no reports saying that “the suspicions have been dispelled.”
Many people are left only with the impression that “Hagiuda seems to have done something wrong in the Kake affair,” and the matter remains in limbo.
For example, during last October’s House of Representatives election, someone heckled me while I was explaining the Kake issue in a street speech.
After the speech, I approached that person and said, “I’ll explain it, so please tell me what you don’t understand.”
The person replied, “I don’t know exactly what, but you must have done something wrong and be lying.
That’s what they said on television.”
Even people who follow the news somewhat more closely have come to believe the story constructed by the opposition and the media: “Hagiuda is a close associate of Prime Minister Abe, served as a visiting professor at an institution affiliated with Kake Gakuen, and is still an honorary visiting professor.
Since he is an interested party, he must have exerted some pressure or influence to establish the new veterinary faculty.”
However, as I explained earlier, we cannot become involved in the application and approval process for special zones.
I gave no instructions whatsoever concerning this matter.
Even if the Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary had instructed officials to expedite procedures for a project whose policy direction had already been decided under the National Strategic Special Zone framework, would it not be misguided to call that pressure?