By KANAKO SANADA/ Staff Writer
January 29, 2025 at 18:18 JST
A correction and apology from the editorial department of Shukan Bunshun are posted on the weekly magazine’s website on Jan. 28. (Kanako Sanada)
Weekly magazine Shukan Bunshun corrected a key part of its initial scoop on the “trouble” between celebrity Masahiro Nakai and a woman that led to a scandal rocking the TV entertainment industry.
The magazine’s editorial department on Jan. 28 released a statement and issued an apology over the article that was distributed online on Dec. 25, 2024, and published in print on Dec. 26.
That article said an executive of Fuji Television Network Inc. in charge of programming had invited the woman to a dinner with Nakai on the day of the incident in June 2023.
The report said that particular part of the article was based on an interview with an acquaintance of the woman.
However, Shukan Bunshun’s editorial department said on Jan. 28 that subsequent interviews revealed that the woman was invited to the dinner party by Nakai, not the Fuji TV executive.
Therefore, the magazine issued the correction and apology.
But the editorial department did not completely absolve the TV broadcaster in the scandal.
“The fact remains that (the Fuji TV executive) was involved in the trouble,” the department said.
It noted that the woman has told the magazine that the dinner “was definitely an extension of a meeting that (the Fuji TV executive) had set up.”
The scandal has fueled speculation that TV broadcasters have sexually exploited female employees to keep the entertainers happy.
Shukan Bunshun’s editorial department said that after the magazine’s Jan. 8 edition, its articles on the issue stated that the woman “was invited by Nakai.”
Satoshi Takeda, editor-in-chief of Shukan Bunshun, told The Asahi Shimbun that former Osaka Governor Toru Hashimoto, who is a lawyer, noticed the magazine’s change concerning the invitation and saw the switch as problematic.
When the magazine interviewed Hashimoto about the trouble involving Nakai, Hashimoto said it was “dishonest” for the magazine to correct the error so matter-of-factly, as if nothing had happened.
The magazine’s editorial department added the correction about the invitation to the Hashimoto interview when it was released on the morning of Jan. 27, Takeda explained.
Some members of the editorial staff also requested a response to the initial report.
The editorial department issued the correction in a statement on the morning of Jan. 28, a day after Fuji Television’s president and chairman announced they would resign at a news conference attended by more than 400 reporters that went on for more than 10 hours.
Some of reporters’ questions were related to the magazine’s initial suggestion that the Fuji TV employee had set up the dinner party between Nakai and the woman.
Both Fuji Television and Nakai, who has retired from the entertainment industry over the trouble with the woman, have consistently denied that the broadcaster or its officials were involved.
Takeda said the magazine “was not waiting to issue a correction until after Fuji TV’s news conference finished.”
But he said, “We did not confirm (the facts) sufficiently.”
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