Photo/Illutration Kio Momoi, second from right, and a male plaintiff, third from right, speak with reporters on June 22 after the Sapporo High Court ruling. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Citizens’ freedom to express their political views in public places is a basic human right that is essential for democracy, and police should exercise extreme caution in obstructing that freedom.

During the campaign period for the 2019 Upper House election, Hokkaido prefectural police officers stopped, and removed from the site, a man and a woman who had jeered then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe while he was stumping in Sapporo.

The Sapporo High Court has recently ruled the action violated the woman’s freedom of expression and ordered the Hokkaido government, which has jurisdiction over the police, to pay 550,000 yen ($3,830) in damages.

The Hokkaido police side had also lost the case in the first trial at the Sapporo District Court.

In the case at issue, the police officers surrounded the woman after she shouted at Abe, “Don’t raise taxes,” and “No to the (ruling) Liberal Democratic Party.”

They grabbed her by the arms and shoulders to remove her and continued to shadow her so she would not approach the stumping venue.

The Police Duties Execution Law provides that police officers may, in the event of urgency, evacuate individuals who may suffer harm or restrain individuals posing a threat.  

The high court ruled that requirement was not met in the woman’s case.

“She made the act of shouting as an expression of a political view per se,” the court said, adding her freedom of expression, freedom of movement and action, and right to honor were infringed upon.

The court rightly rendered its ruling.

In the action in question, a number of police officers persisted, for example, in calling out to her and blocking her way for 40 to 50 minutes on a crowded street. That went too far.

Hokkaido police should apologize to the woman and take measures to prevent a repeat of similarly illegal intervention.

Stumping provides an opportunity for those in political power to interact, in an open manner, with citizens who have diverse views.

In the given case, however, police took away the opportunity for simply being at a campaign venue from people just because they had uttered words to condemn political goings-on.

A democratic society would be finished if something like that were to go rampant and stifled expressions of complaint and dissent.

Abe was fatally shot last July. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida faced a bomb attack in April.

Both incidents occurred during an election campaign period and raised questions on how key figures should be protected. 

It is, needless to say, important to ensure security on any given scene.

As a matter of course, however, it is one thing to direct a statement of opinion toward a politician and quite another to put the politician in danger of harm.

Unconvincingly, the high court decision did not find illegal the police act of moving away the man, who had shouted, among other things, “You should resign, Abe!”

The court said the man was in imminent danger of being assaulted because an offended LDP official next to him had shoved his arm.

The court, however, should have examined if there was no other option than to have the man removed.

The district court had been careful enough to note that Hokkaido police failed to take other measures, such as intervening between the man and the individual who had pushed him.

The authorities should return to the spirit of the Police Law, which provides that police activities should make impartiality a principle and should not intervene in the rights and freedoms of individuals that the Constitution guarantees.

--The Asahi Shimbun, June 25

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