NHK Chairman Bows in Apology for Firing Staffer Over Sexual Misconduct — and for On-Air Talent’s Abuse of Employee — Vows to Rethink Boozy ‘Dinner Parties’

From our other sites

The story

At its regular press briefing on September 16, NHK revealed it had handed down the harshest possible penalty — dismissal — to a reporter in his twenties for sexually touching a colleague without consent. At the same briefing, Chairman Tatsuhiko Inoue bowed his head for about five seconds while remaining seated to apologize for a separate case disclosed last month, in which a staff member was driven to take leave or resign after suffering unwanted sexual abuse from a program’s on-air talent. The chairman said the two incidents should not be treated as isolated cases but as a reflection of problems across the organization as a whole, adding that while both involved dinner gatherings where alcohol was served, “this isn’t meant to condemn such gatherings themselves.” On 5channel, users questioned why the chairman apologized while seated and why the talent responsible in the harassment case still hasn’t been named.

NHK held its regular press conference on the 16th at its Tokyo headquarters. It announced that, effective the 9th of this month, it had issued its harshest penalty — dismissal — to a reporter in his twenties who engaged in unwanted sexual physical contact.

Chairman Tatsuhiko Inoue, present at the briefing, also apologized for the case disclosed at last month’s emergency press conference, in which a staff member was driven to take leave or resign after suffering unwanted sexual abuse at the hands of a program’s on-air talent. Citing damage to “viewers’ trust,” the chairman bowed his head for roughly five seconds while remaining seated.

Regarding both cases, he stated that they should not be viewed as “individual, isolated incidents” but rather prompt a reexamination of the organization as a whole. He also noted that since both cases involved gatherings where alcohol was consumed, “this isn’t meant to condemn dinner gatherings that involve drinking.”

Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here

What people said

3AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:01
Japanese TV networks are finished lol

[Bunshun scoop] TBS covers up VIVANT director Katsuo Fukuzawa's (62) 'bone-breaking harassment' (victim needed a full month to recover, yet he got a laughably light punishment)
https://hayabusa9.5ch.net/test/read.cgi/mnewsplus/1789528536/
4AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:01
Is this a different case from the one where a talent did the same thing before? So basically they're still letting this guy run around harassing people just fine?
5AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:02
Who's the talent?
Just name the guy already.
6AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:02
Somebody just say it.
He might be doing the exact same thing at other networks too.
10AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:03
Wake up — it's this whole 'showbiz buddies cover for each other' culture that keeps letting the damage spread.
11AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:03
Funny how sensitive info never leaks out of NHK.
Meanwhile at Fuji TV it leaks straight to one specific tabloid almost instantly.
14AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:05
It's already out in the open, isn't it.
Come on, use our license fees to at least cover it up properly.
18AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:06
What's with this 'reconsider' business…?
21AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:07
Re: #18
He's probably just reminiscing about it with a dreamy look on his face.
19AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:06
Surprising that not a single tabloid reported on who the perpetrator is.
20AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:07
Well, that's just the national character for you lol, it's normal here.
If it's eating at you, just learn to forget about it.
25AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:11
So this talent is still appearing on commercial TV with zero consequences?
29AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:12
The so-called 'Bunshun Cannon' — really just a glorified tip-off megaphone. (nickname for Shukan Bunshun's tabloid scoops)
36AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:15
He apologized while seated?
79AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:56
Re: #36
And a seated press conference to boot.
41AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:18
They say kids these days don't even own a TV — turns out that might actually be the smart move lol
43AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:20
Are the fired employee and the victimized employee two separate cases?
Were they all partying it up together?
44AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:21
The perpetrator's probably banned from NHK for life at this point — but who is it?
45AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:21
I don't even pay the license fee and I still watch 'DogHK' (a mocking nickname for NHK, playing on the kanji for 'dog'), so let me drop some hard truth here —
it's one thing for a free commercial network to shield a perpetrator,
but isn't it way too much for NHK — which collects license fees straight from viewers — to be harboring a criminal?
And isn't telling viewers what they actually want to know supposed to be your entire job?
50AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:28
Alcohol really does cause more harm than good, doesn't it.
59AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:34
Re: #50
That's exactly why I only ever drink alone.
51AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:29
Re: #1
Funny how the feminists have gone completely silent on this one.
53AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:30
Why still hasn't the perpetrator in that earlier sexual assault case been identified?
55AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:31
In cases like this you'd think the perpetrator's agency, if he has one, would hand down some kind of punishment, but there's no word on that either — who on earth is it?
56AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:32
And here they were, after investigating the Nakai case, flatly declaring NHK had nothing like this going on. (referring to the Masahiro Nakai scandal)
57AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:33
What do you even mean by 'reconsider' lol
Just make them stop already.
60AnonymousSep 16, 2026 15:34
Re: #1
There's no sexual assault here.

Setting the victim aside, if the perpetrator's name never comes out and there's no criminal complaint filed, then as far as anyone's concerned the incident never happened.

If it's just a private settlement between individuals, there's no obligation to announce it publicly anyway.

In other words, no sexual assault ever took place.

Background and Key Points of This Story

NHK is a network with a well-known history of alcohol-related scandals, dating back to the 2018 incident involving TOKIO’s Tatsuya Yamaguchi. This time, two separate cases — “a reporter dismissed for misconduct” and “a staffer sexually abused by an on-air talent” — were addressed at the same press conference, which led to some confusion on the forum thread about whether they were connected. NHK itself framed the two not as isolated incidents but as symptoms of a broader organizational problem, without disclosing the real names or exact relationship between the perpetrators and victims involved. The thread mainly split over two points: whether it was appropriate for the chairman to apologize while remaining seated for roughly five seconds, and frustration that the talent responsible in the harassment case still hasn’t been named. Some pointed out that, unlike commercial broadcasters, information rarely leaks out of NHK to the tabloid press. Meanwhile, the chairman’s comment that he wasn’t condemning “dinner gatherings involving alcohol” reads more like a nod toward preventing recurrence than a genuine effort to get to the root cause — and the briefing gave no real indication of what concrete measures, if any, will actually follow.

*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5channel (Geinou/Sports News+) thread “NHK Chairman Bows in Apology for Firing Staffer Over Sexual Misconduct — and for On-Air Talent’s Abuse of Employee — Vows to Rethink Boozy ‘Dinner Parties’.”

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *