Kirk here. The elderly gentleman you see was describing the suffering of his mother, who died from Minamata disease, to Ito Shintaro, Minister of the Environment, when he was prompted to “wrap it up” (matomete) by a ministry bureaucrat. Not particularly nice but sort of understandable given the need to limit each speaker to three minutes that had been conveyed earlier. But, what came next was something that has really made lots of people (including me) angry. Seconds after the gentleman began to try to conclude his short presentation, his mic was cut.
Moreover, he was not the only victim; at least one other gentleman’s mic was also cut off mid-sentence. Then, a ministry bureaucrat tried to say that what happened was “inadvertent” (futegiwa). If a mute switch gets hit once, that might be “inadvertent” but when you do it twice (or more?) at the same three-minute point, that’s different; it may be a “bad decision” (to handle it that way) or a “mistake” (to be so incredibly insensitive) but it’s not “inadvertent.”
An hour or two earlier, Minister Ito had actually recognized and apologized for the government’s failure to prevent Chisso from poisoning the people of Minamata. In response, some said that the apology was a step in the right direction but that the Ministry needs to actually take steps to help the victims. I feel like the Ministry, despite Minister Ito’s words, showed their true colors by cutting off the mics of the patients and family member. That behavior is more consistent with the historical stance of the Ministry than Minister Ito’s apology.
By the way, another point that came up in the meeting with the patients and family members was the failure of the government to do a proper survey of people living in affected areas to determine the health impacts on people who have not come forward to be certified as patients. The response of the Minister was something like “we’re thinking about taking steps to begin getting ready to form a committee to decide when we might be able to start considering such a survey” (only slightly exaggerated). The phrase “justice delayed is justice denied” comes to mind. The Ministry has been delaying the start of such a survey for decades (the better part of a century, depending on how you look at it).
All of this illustrates how horrible treatment of Minamata disease patients is not a historical issue; it’s ongoing.