Strange Culture and Art of LDP

The conservatives in America strictly apply freedom rights to their policies. In Japan, conservative politicians ignore those rights. Young lawmakers affiliated with Liberal Democratic Party held a meeting, in which they discussed how to crush newspapers and TV stations down. When they are frustrated with news reports, those lawmakers think such reports should be eliminated, not persuading reporters with discussion or appropriate policies. This is how young democracy is deteriorated.

Council of Culture and Art in LDP, a policy forum of young lawmakers led by a member of House of Representatives Minoru Kihara, had a meeting on Wednesday. In the meeting, an eccentric conservative novelist, Naoki Hyakuta, made a keynote speech, in which he criticized Japanese media as devaluing Japan.

According to an article of Asahi Shimbun, the meeting was closed to media after Hyakuta’s speech and frustration to media reports were flourished from some of forty lawmakers attended there. “To punish media, choking their income from advertisement must be the best way. I hope the party to instruct economic organizations, like Keidanren, not to pay for a corporation misleading Japan,” told Hideo Onishi, a Representative from Tokyo.

Then, their topic shifted to Okinawa, where consistent protest against relocation plan of U.S. military base. “It was a corruption of post-war conservatism,” told Takashi Nagao, a Representative from Nagasaki, “to establish a special media structure in Okinawa. People’s opinion in Okinawawas twisted and hijacked by the leftists.” Following Nagao, Hyakuta encouraged the lawmakers to crush down two local newspapers in Okinawa. “The leftist media accuse that American soldiers rape Okinawan girls, because U.S. bases are there. But it’s a terrible lie in terms of statistics. The ratio of rape crime between man and woman in Okinawa is higher than those made by U.S. soldiers there,” told Hyakuta.

The opposite parties denounced those young LDP lawmakers in the Committee of Security Legislature on Friday. Urged by committee members, Chairman Yasukazu Hamada (LDP) confirmed the facts and expressed a regret on it. “Many people say many things. I cannot apologize for it without reconfirmation about the facts that was not made on my watch,” said Abe in the committee. The discussion on controversial security legislature will be further delayed by this gaffe scandal.

Heaven’s net has large mashes, but nothing escapes. The discussion points of young legislatures were likely to be what were always in Abe’s mind. The reason why Okinawa was targeted was because it was the region with biggest protest against Abe administration. Abe administration has been no choice to rely on the authority of national government, but it used it in a wrong way. But in democracy, a government cannot crush people’s opinion, which is a fundamental content of democratic society.