Taking Responsibility for Increasing Refusals to Pay Subscription Fees

Katsuji Ebisawa, president of NHK, a Japanese public broadcasting company, announced his resignation from his post, taking responsibility for a series of corruption cases among his staff.

According to the Asahi Newspaper on January 7, Ebisawa said in a press conference on the previous day that he would decide his course of action after putting the reliability of NHK on the right track and after the Diet approves the 2005 budget.

Although he did not elaborate on the timing of his resignation, NHK executives consider his remark as a declaration of his will to resign, the newspaper said. The budget for NHK is expected to be deliberated and approved by the Diet in late March.

A former NHK political reporter, Ebisawa was appointed as a third-term president last year and his tenure ends July next year.

After graduating from Waseda University, he joined NHK in 1957 and was promoted from a political reporter to political section manager, executive director, vice president, until inaugurated as president in 1997.

However, he has been under pressure to resign from labor unions and the public as some 10 corruption cases such as embezzlement of production cost and subscription fees, which were covered up in the past, came to light last year. A total of 113,000 households in Japan have refused to pay subscription fees after the corruption cases were revealed.

Hun-Joo Cho hanscho@donga.com