Photo/Illutration Holding a sign that urges caution against the new coronavirus, Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike gives a news conference at the metropolitan government building on Aug. 6. (Yosuke Fukudome)

Bureaucrats in the Tokyo metropolitan government go to great lengths to make Governor Yuriko Koike look good, even if it means deleting or revising remarks she made at news conferences when her comments are later posted online as part of the official record.

Koike has drawn fire in the past over some of her comments, which online critics labeled as “condescending.”

No explanation has ever been offered for the practice of making revisions to comments uttered by Koike, 68, on the Tokyo metropolitan government's official website.

Officials explained that they had edited the texts to correct figures when they were misquoted by the governor or when they believed the revisions would make them “easier to read.”

The Office of the Governor for Policy Planning, which is in charge of releasing written records on Koike’s news conferences, pledged to publish Koike’s comments verbatim from now on and add notes to correct information if it is wrong.

The metropolitan government usually releases a video of a news conference given by the governor right after Koike has spoken to the media.

Texts of what she said at the news conferences are generally uploaded hours later.

According to the Tokyo government, officials are aware of at least nine instances since April, the start of the current fiscal year, when the minutes of her news conferences were published after they were partially deleted or revised.

Most of the cases concerned factual errors, such as the governor misquoting a sum of outstanding metropolitan government bonds.

But some of her remarks were dropped from the published record simply because officials felt they would be more easily understood.

One case concerned a July 3 news conference during which Koike noted that new coronavirus infections are spreading as a result of people dining out together.

“Some restaurants should place acrylic panels (as a precaution against the virus), and customers had sukiyaki where acrylic panels were put up. I don’t understand why they say they had good sukiyaki. I must say I find their comments rather odd,” she said.

Her comments quickly drew condemnation on the internet.

The published version included only her mention of acrylic panels, not the rest of her remarks.

An official with the Office of the Governor for Police Planning said it was edited out purely to make her remarks easier to understand.

“We have no other intentions whatsoever,” the official said. “We were not aware of criticism on the internet concerning her remarks at the news conference. We were given no instruction to revise (the transcription) from the governor or her aides.”

In one case that was not included in the nine cases grasped by the metropolitan government, Koike named a reporter to ask her a question, saying it would be the last at the news conference. But her comment at the time was not included in the official record of the news conference.

When Shintaro Ishihara was in office as Tokyo governor from 1999 to 2012, records of his news conferences were released with notes added to provide accurate explanations when he gave misinformation, according to the metropolitan government.

The metropolitan government said it was not clear when the practice of partially deleting or revising the governor’s remarks began.

Koike said she has not checked details of the records of each of her news conferences.

“I believe that it is necessary to convey the content in a way to make it easier to grasp for Tokyo residents,” she said at a news conference on Aug. 21. “I instructed the office in question to handle the matter appropriately.”

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