Official WG minutes and cabinet decisions conclusively show that the phrase “Prime Minister’s intention” has no factual basis. Media reliance on MEXT documents alone represents a collapse of evidence-based reporting.

The phrase “Prime Minister’s intention” was fabricated after the decision had already been settled.

2017-07-13

The following continues from the previous chapter.

A knockout loss for the Ministry of Education.

In the Kake Gakuen issue, the credibility of the MEXT documents is the central point.

The media and opposition parties assume as a premise that the MEXT documents are correct.

However, this premise collapses immediately when examined against the benchmark of the Special Strategic Zone Working Group minutes.

These minutes are documents whose contents were agreed upon by both MEXT and the Cabinet Secretariat.

The MEXT documents highlighted by the media are merely internal ministry documents and were not reviewed by the Cabinet Secretariat.

In this respect, the minutes possess overwhelmingly greater evidentiary value.

Moreover, the minutes were created earlier than the MEXT documents.

Documents written later can potentially alter or distort those written earlier.

In this respect as well, the minutes are more reliable than the MEXT documents.

Since it would be difficult for ordinary citizens to examine the vast number of minutes, the author extracts the relevant portions.

By reviewing the following two sets of minutes and the cabinet decision, the truth behind the MEXT documents becomes clear.

The June 8, 2015 Special Strategic Zone Working Group minutes.

The June 29, 2015 cabinet decision, specifically the MEXT section.

The September 16, 2016 Special Strategic Zone Working Group minutes.

The media ignore these documents and report solely on the MEXT documents, guided only by assumptions.

This is not journalism but fake news.

By examining the first and third minutes, it is clear that in the deregulation debate between the Cabinet Secretariat and special zone experts on one side and MEXT and the Ministry of Agriculture on the other, the pro-deregulation side achieved a complete victory.

Using a baseball analogy, it was a 10–0, five-inning mercy-rule win.

Before doubting this claim, readers should examine the documents themselves.

The cabinet decision shows that MEXT, which holds licensing authority and bears the burden of proof for demand forecasts regarding new veterinary schools, failed entirely to fulfill its role.

Furthermore, the decision set a deadline within fiscal year 2015, meaning by March 2016, to determine whether new veterinary schools should be established.

MEXT failed to meet even this deadline.

Under these circumstances, a knockout loss for MEXT is unavoidable.

The deregulation debate related to this issue had already been settled at the level of section chief negotiations.

Therefore, there was absolutely no room for any so-called “Prime Minister’s intention” to intervene.

Nevertheless, the media continued to focus solely on whether the MEXT documents were authentic.

Even if they were authentic, they were created in late September 2016.

This was after the deadline imposed on MEXT in March 2016 and even after the creation of the third set of minutes.

Put plainly, after the outcome had already been decided, MEXT was merely offering excuses.

The phrase “Prime Minister’s intention” appearing in those documents is a fabrication by MEXT.

To be continued.