Threats, intimidation and defamatory remarks, both in person and on social media, overshadowed the Hyogo gubernatorial election.

The targets of the attacks were mainly members of a special committee that is investigating accusations of power harassment and corruption against Motohiko Saito, who won the governor’s race.

“Come out, Okutani,” Takashi Tachibana, the leader of the anti-NHK political party, shouted in front of the home and office of Kenichi Okutani, chairman of the prefectural assembly’s investigative committee, in early November during the campaign.

Tachibana entered the gubernatorial race just to support Saito.

“I’d better stop here. It would be a problem if he ended up taking his own life from being threatened too much,” Tachibana said through a loudspeaker.

His speeches, along with laughter from onlookers, were captured on video and widely shared on social media.

The special investigative committee (called the Article 100 Committee) was set up by the assembly in June to investigate allegations made in a document that Saito, in his first term as governor, had engaged in power harassment and improperly accepted gifts.

The whistleblower who made and circulated the document had headed the prefectural government branch office in charge of the Nishi-Harima region. That official, who was suspended by Saito’s administration, was found dead, apparently by suicide, in July.

Okutani said he had his family leave the house, describing Tachibana’s actions as “extremely frightening.”

He is considering filing a criminal complaint against Tachibana for defamation and other offenses.

Posts from multiple social media accounts alleged that Okutani had accessed personal documents in the whistleblower’s work computer and then pressured the media into covering them up.

Other posts said the prefectural government had intended to publicly announce the results of the investigation into the whistleblower’s document, but that Okutani delayed releasing the information.

Okutani dismissed these claims as false, saying, “It’s truly frightening how misinformation can spread so easily through social media.”

Tachibana defended his actions on his YouTube channel, saying, “I was just giving a campaign speech.”

“(Okutani’s statement) at a news conference that ‘Tachibana threatened (Okutani’s family) and his mother is troubled’ amounts to defamation against me,” he said.

ANOTHER MEMBER RESIGNS OVER POSTS

Social media posts naming another prefectural assembly member of the investigative committee may have triggered his resignation.

Hideaki Takeuchi resigned as an assembly member on Nov. 18, the day after the gubernatorial election, citing “personal reasons.”

Hidekazu Ueno, secretary-general of the Hyogo Citizens Union, a political group to which Takeuchi belonged, said various social media posts about Takeuchi influenced his decision to resign, considering the impact on his family and his own physical and mental health.

“The spread of verbal and online abuse placed a heavy emotional burden on his family, and I was told his family urged him to step away from politics,” Ueno said.

COORDINATED FALSE REPORTING?

According to the campaign team of Kazumi Inamura, a rival candidate to Saito in the gubernatorial election, the official X (formerly Twitter) account of her support group was suddenly suspended on Nov. 6.

The support group quickly created another account, but that was also frozen on Nov. 12.

After appealing to X to lift the suspension, the original account was restored on Nov. 15, but her support group had been unable to make any posts during the suspension.

Inamura’s campaign team alleges that a coordinated effort to report her support group’s accounts to X caused the suspensions.

Her campaign team plans to file a criminal complaint with the Hyogo prefectural police on allegations of fraudulent obstruction of business by unidentified individuals.

According to X’s website, accounts involved in harassment, such as threats or impersonation, may be subject to suspension, and users can report these accounts.

The Asahi Shimbun asked X why it suspended Inamura’s support group’s accounts but has not received a response.