The Fisheries Agency
of Japan (FAJ) acknowledged and publicly
apologised for embezzlement within the whaling
industry. An official from the powerful
agency gave a 90 degree bow of apology on
national television and explained that five
officers were being punished for accepting
around 272,000 Yen (approximately $3,000
USD) worth of whale meat ‘gifts’. This is
hard evidence that the whale meat embezzlement
scandal exposed by Toru and I back in 2008,
and supported in court with witness statements,
did in fact exist, and that the corruption
stretched from the factory ship floor right
up into the government agencies overseeing
the whaling programme. Straight from the
horse’s mouth, and on national television
no less.
The bow in the video
may look like posturing, but I can assure
you that this was very unusual for Japan
– particularly considering this was about
whaling! An FAJ official apologising for
something whaling-related would have been
unthinkable only a few months ago, yet here
we are.
The FAJ confirmed that
the five officials who received whale meat
faced disciplinary action. Toru and I intercepted
a box of embezzled whale meat in 2008, and
used it to expose the embezzlement scandal
the FAJ has now admitted to. We were tried
on allegations of ‘theft’ and ‘trespass’
and handed a one year sentence, suspended
for three, in 2010. We don't know what exact
punishment the officials have been handed,
but we know that they have not been put
on trial or given jail time. The meat they
admitted accepting was worth roughly six
times what Toru and I were accused of taking.
Workers unload whale
meat from the Nisshin Maru, Japan's factory
whaling ship, which returns to the Southern
Ocean every year for so called "science".
Since the apology in
December, more information has come to light,
and the agency has admitted that another
two key officials (managers) have also been
officially warned. One of these senior managers
was Jun Yamashita, the number two civil
servant at the FAJ and a prominent negotiator
at the International Whaling Commission
(IWC) meetings. Yamashita has since left
the agency altogether.
This is a major development
and a wholly positive one for an end to
Japanese whaling. Yamashita was involved
in the various whaling negotiations, including
a meeting of pro-whaling factions in Shimonoseki
last November.
The Tokyo Two trial,
the FAJ apologies and demotions, and a surge
in media coverage questioning the corrupt
whaling programme have all impacted Japanese
public opinion (especially considering the
utter lack of interest in eating whale meat).
People are beginning to see that whaling
serves no purpose and does not benefit Japan.
For my father’s generation, whale meat was
everywhere: in schools, supermarkets, and
izakayas (Japanese style pubs). These days,
signs of the whaling industry are hard to
find and the stockpile of frozen meat is
at an all-time high,[link to stockpile graph]
despite reduced catches and serious - but
failed- marketing attempts to get rid of
the stockpile.
Last week, Kazuo Yamamura,
the CEO of whaling fleet operator Kyodo
Senpaku and head of the Japan Whaling Association
(JWA), also admitted that whale meat sales
dropped 30% in the first half of the 2010
fiscal year, forcing the JWA - the largest
promoter of whale meat in Japan - to downscale
its activities. The situation is clear:
the industry is slipping faster and faster
down the spiral. Our campaign to hit whale
meat sales in Japan is surely working.
The fleet is ailing,
each year they voluntarily catch less whales
that they cannot sell or afford to keep
storing. The stockpiled meat and the lack
of revenue means the ships cannot be maintained
or replaced without even more substantial
injections of public money. The government
should not waste any more money on this
programme given that these recent admissions
are clearly just the tip of the iceberg.
With
all of these different threads of change
coming together, I am confident that what
we are seeing is the last chapter of Japan’s
whaling program. If our appeal is successful
and Toru's and my conviction is overturned
by the High Court on May 24, then we will
undoubtedly be even closer to closing the
book.
