Have you ever heard of the term “hostage justice”?

This is a practice of detaining suspects for extended periods of time in order to coerce confessions. It has resulted in many wrongful convictions. Iwao Hakamada, whose innocence was established 58 years after the incident, was another victim of hostage justice.

Interrogations are carried out by police officers and prosecutors, and detention is authorized by judges. Hostage justice has become a standard practice since it got implemented as a system.

The Japanese government has been frequently urged to abolish hostage justice by international organizations like the United Nations Committee against Torture, but the Japan’s power structure is unwilling to relinquish the system.

There is an organization that the power structure is trying to crush by fully operating the hostage justice system on an unprecedented scale. It is a labor union made up of mixer truck drivers, the “Kansai District Ready-Mixed Concrete Branch of the All Japan Construction and Transport Workers Solidarity Union.” It is commonly known as the “Kan-nama.”

The members of Kan-nama were detained for long periods, including Chairman Yuji Yukawa, who was detained for 644 days. The crackdown began in 2018 under the Shinzo Abe administration, and a total of 87 people have been arrested. The police, including the Osaka Prefectural Police, Kyoto Prefectural Police, Shiga Prefectural Police, and Wakayama Prefectural Police, acted simultaneously.

What is serious is that the police and prosecutors are treating union activities, such as strikes and collective bargaining with management, as “crimes.” Article 28 of the Constitution recognizes the right to engage in union activities. The investigative authorities are blatantly violating the Constitution.

Under the hostage justice system, something that is not a crime is made into a crime. Why is the investigative agency resorting to such irresponsible and unruly behavior?

Company unions are “privileged groups” for full-time employees

To understand why, we first need to understand labor unions in Japan.

​​Japan’s labor unions are predominantly enterprise-based. In most cases, only full-time employees of the company can join. Moreover, unions mainly exist in large corporations.

A company-specific labor union cannot fulfill its role since the company’s employees alone will not yield enough outcomes from negotiations with management. Management holds the power over personnel affairs, so unions cannot be forceful.

In other countries, labor unions are “industrial labor unions.” They operate across company boundaries for all workers in that industry. Workers from different workplaces, whether regular or non-regular, work together to negotiate with industry management using strikes and other measures. Because the balance of power is equal, it is easier to improve the treatment of workers.

There should be no distinction between regular and non-regular workers who work hard in the first place. It cannot be called a labor union when it works exclusively to advance the interests of a company’s regular workers. It is a “privileged group” that is in collusion with management.

Kan-nama is an industrial labor union for people working in the ready-mix concrete industry. Anyone can join Kan-nama, regardless of which company they work for or if one is a day laborer.

Kan-nama that the Japan Business Federation feared

When industrial unions become active, it is management that suffers. In contrast to corporate unions, industrial unions are difficult for management to control because they cannot be subdued by granting exclusive privileges to the company’s own employees.

Bunpei Otsuki, who served as president of Mitsubishi Mining and Cement Co., Ltd. and as chairman of the Japan Federation of Employers’ Association (now the Japan Business Federation) from 1979 to 1987, had this to say about the activities of Kan-nama:

“I will not let Kan-nama’s movement (in the west region) spread to the rest of Japan.”

“A threat to the very foundation of capitalism”

In other words, if an industrial labor union like Kan-nama was to be established in the East region, it would pose a threat to Japanese capitalism.

The core of Japanese capitalism is the Japan Business Federation, which is made up of large corporations. The Japan Business Federation “buys” the policies of the Liberal Democratic Party with political donations, and the large corporations make a profit. This has been the pattern for a long time, as it is shown in the series where Tansa analyzed the relationship between donation data from large corporations to the LDP over a period of about 50 years and the policy requests of the Japan Business Federation.

The head of the Japan Business Federation felt that Kan-nama was a threat.

Moreover, the number of non-regular workers has now increased to 40%. Behind this crackdown is thought to be a sense of fear on the side of economic and political power.

“Other people’s pain is my pain”

Japan is a country where “sovereignty resides with the people.” We only delegate power to the government for convenience. The police and prosecutors are public servants. It is out of the question to oppress a labor union recognized by the constitution, as in this case. The constitution is there to keep the power structures in check.

However, today, the powerful structures disregard the Constitution. It is journalists and the news organizations who should play a critical role in stopping this rampage.

Nonetheless, mainstream media outlets such as newspapers and broadcasts are helping the police and prosecutors. They use press clubs as their base and report stories that follow the police and prosecutors’ scripts. When union members from Kan-nama are arrested, they report on them as if they are a criminal without even interviewing them.

Most mainstream media outlets pay no attention to the human rights violations that are shaking the foundations of democracy in the first place. Perhaps working as part of a vested interest group, they have lost the ability to imagine what it is like for people outside that group.

There is a phrase that the members of Kan-nama hold dear.

“Other people’s pain is my pain”

Tansa values ​​this phrase, which is also relevant to journalism. We fight by exposing the reality of out-of-control power structure.

We hope that other media organizations and journalists will join in solidarity, and we sincerely hope that readers will also fight back as sovereign citizens.

February 5, 2025

Tokyo Investigative Newsroom Tansa

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