It started as a scoop in a weekly tabloid: the allegation {that a} middle-aged former boy-band star turned prime tv host had paid hush cash to a lady for unspecified wrongdoing.
Different articles adopted, asserting that it was a case of sexual assault, and stirring a wave of public outrage not solely towards the ex-singer but in addition his employer, a serious TV broadcaster, for the way it dealt with the state of affairs.
On Thursday, the person on the heart of the controversy introduced his retirement, however the episode had already changed into a second of reckoning. A world investor has criticized the corporate, Tokyo-based Fuji Tv, and Japan’s largest company advertisers have lined as much as boycott it. Some 75 corporations, together with Toyota, SoftBank and the native operator of McDonald’s, have pulled adverts and sponsorships.
Not a single business now seems on the station’s programming; advert spots at the moment are full of unpaid public service bulletins. Tens of thousands and thousands of {dollars} in income is at stake as indignant C.E.O.s have known as on Fuji TV to handle the problem.
“We’ll stop putting commercials with the corporate till a radical investigation is performed, the details are clarified, and applicable motion is taken,” Takeshi Minakata, president of the drink maker Kirin, said in a statement, which added that the corporate was appearing “primarily based on our human rights coverage.”
Specialists say the anger reveals a brand new intolerance for sexual misconduct set in movement by an earlier scandal. Two years in the past, it emerged that the founding father of a prime expertise company had sexually abused younger males for many years. He died in 2019 with out ever going through any expenses, and company sponsors had been accused of getting ignored the wrongdoing on the company, Johnny & Associates.
This time, large companies are keen to indicate that issues have modified.
“The Johnny scandal marked a turning level,” mentioned Ryu Honma, who has written extensively in regards to the promoting and media industries. “The sponsors had been blamed for complicity on account of their inaction.”
The present case got here to mild in mid-December, when a weekly tabloid known as Josei Seven reported that Masahiro Nakai, of the disbanded however nonetheless immensely common group SMAP, had grow to be embroiled in “critical hassle” with a lady.
The article mentioned that Mr. Nakai, 52, had paid 90 million yen, or nearly $600,000, to the girl, who has not been publicly recognized. Subsequent tales by different native media extra clearly characterised what occurred as a sexual assault.
Earlier this month, Mr. Nakai admitted that an “incident” had taken place and that he had paid to settle it. He mentioned that he had used no violence within the encounter, which passed off in June 2023, and that he subsequently felt justified in his resolution to proceed to look on TV. There have been no official investigations into the case.
Unrelenting criticism and the advert boycott pressured him to reverse that call. On Thursday, Mr. Nakai introduced that he was retiring from leisure and dissolving his expertise company.
“I don’t suppose that this fulfills all my duties,” he said in a statement, promising to “sincerely cooperate” in any investigation. “I apologize as soon as once more from my coronary heart to the opposite occasion.”
Anger has additionally grown at Fuji TV, the place Mr. Nakai was a preferred present host. Based on the tabloid article, it was a Fuji TV worker who arrange the assembly in 2023 between Mr. Nakai and the girl within the case.
Fuji TV initially issued a imprecise denial of “reviews in some weekly magazines.” But it surely later mentioned it was creating an in-house committee to research the allegation involving Mr. Nakai, in addition to different information media reviews that it had lengthy rewarded male expertise by arranging encounters with feminine announcers.
Fuji TV has come beneath criticism for being sluggish to confront the state of affairs extra straight, and in addition for the way it ultimately did so: at a information convention open solely to pick media, at which no livestreaming or cameras had been allowed.
On the information convention, held final week, Fuji TV’s president mentioned his firm had realized in regards to the episode proper after it occurred however didn’t disclose it.
“Our resolution on the time was to not make the matter public, however to respect the girl’s want to return to work and to prioritize her bodily and psychological restoration and the safety of her privateness,” mentioned the president, Koichi Minato.
The information convention additionally got here after an American shareholder, an funding firm known as Dalton Investments, sent a letter to Fuji TV’s management harshly criticizing the corporate’s failure to react to — a lot much less repair — its issues.
The state of affairs with Mr. Nakai “displays not solely an issue within the leisure business typically, however, particularly, it exposes critical flaws in your company governance,” the letter mentioned. “The shortage of consistency and, importantly, transparency in each reporting the details and the following unforgivable shortcomings in your response benefit critical condemnation.”
The day after Fuji TV’s information convention, large Japanese corporations started saying that they had been pulling their adverts.
On Thursday, Fuji TV’s father or mother firm, Fuji Media Holdings, weighed in. The president, Osamu Kanemitsu, mentioned that it was “crucial that we regain the belief of our staff, sponsors and viewers.” He introduced that the corporate’s board had determined in an emergency assembly to determine an unbiased committee to look at Fuji TV’s response.
“It took time for the conclusion to unfold that they can not look the opposite method,” mentioned Mr. Honma, the promoting and media critic. “When large clients begin to go away, it brings motion.”