nuclear-news

Plea for retired journalists to return and save Japans press freedoms in the face of censorship and control!

Image source ; http://www.stripes.com/news/legal-experts-worry-japan-s-secrecy-law-may-silence-journalists-1.257943

“Those journalists that used to stand by the side of someone crying,

now stand by those in power.”

Hidetoshi Kiyotake 2015

Summarised by Shaun McGee

Posted to Nuclear-news.net

posted 3 April 2015

Comments from the Chairman of the press committee
The reason for the Press freedom Award in Japan is because of the fact that in 2010 Japan was 11th in the rankings for press freedom according to Reporters Without Borders. Japan now has a position of 61st (just behind South Korea and far behind Croatia) out of 180 countries.

The State Secrets Act of 2013 makes nuclear power and relations with the USA taboo for journalists. Journalist freedoms are being eroded to stop embarrassing details from being made public. The governments and Corporations also have been directly influencing Broadcasters and Journalists.

Japanese Media are more fearful and are more wimpy than ever before.

For instance the story of the Education ministers links to the Yakuza has been grossly under reported and there are other scandals not reported also.

The Freedom of the Press Awards will be formally announced on the 3rd May 2015 (World Press Day)
There will be one Award for investigative journalism and another award for non journalism but have contributed to Freedom of information causes.
The prizes are to confer due recognition that is supportive of Open Society, Free Speech and democratic accountability.

Minora Tanaka(Investigative journalist also on the judging panel for the Award)
Tanaka San has been investigating a range of subjects over the years including issues surrounding the nuclear energy industry.
Tanaka San begins outlining a problem called SLAPPs (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) against journalists getting too near the truth and these defamation cases have had a chilling effect on journalism. Even if the case is withdrawn because it is a weak case it could be years before that happens and by then time , money and stress will have taken their toll.
Added to the fact that the imposition of the Orwellian State Secrets Act of 2013, Journalism in Japan is in dire straights.
Tanaka San finishes of his statement by exclaiming;
“I am Kenji” (In reference to the recently murdered journalist)

Hidetoshi Kiyotake (Investigative journalist and author)
Currently he has six lawsuits on the go and has 2 of them due in court next week (SLAPPs). Whilst not attending court Kiyotake San likes to do some journalism research and writing. He also leaves time for the freedom of the press issues also. He worked for the Yomuri Shimbun for many years as a financial analyst and has held managerial positions. In 2011 he was dismissed from his post and is now an independent journalist. He one a non fiction prize last year.
He quotes as an example his research into the Sony corporation where he reported on the use of “Isolation Rooms” being used as a punishment for employees.
He then goes onto say that reporting on government and corporate scandals and stories is getting harder and harder all the time, whilst the number of investigative journalists are going down.
It would appear that journalists have become numb to the big changes within these media corporations.
As an example he states that a story of 10,000 or 20,000 people being sacked is not a shock to them anymore.
There have been many job loses also in the media and that also would have been frowned on in the recent past in Japan.
Kiyotake San goes onto ask the question if Japan uses a managerial style that takes into account human dignity and long term perspective as it once did?
As an example he relates a story in the past where a Japanese CEO of Sony asks the CEO of GE on what might be the best managerial style. The CEO of GE announced that if a worker wakes up and is upbeat and positive about his oncoming work day than the right managerial style has been used.

“Those that used to stand by the side of someone crying now stand by those in power.”

Kiyotake San then went on to explain his hopes for the future.

He calls for retired investigative journalists to leave retirement and to come back to the job of reporting and to find some platform in the media or on the internet to publish their articles.

He also calls for working journalists to research topics and publish on other formats to increase competition and improve the quality of reporting and the oversight of government and corporations.

He finishes by asking journalists to not be content with being in a closed club but to go out and publish as independent journalists as well.

Questions and answers on the source video

UPDATE

Edited version by missmilkytheclown1 on YouTube for easy listening

April 3, 2015 - Posted by arclight2011part2 | Japan, media