October 4, 2025

A panel exhibition discriminatory to the Ainu people which Japan’s largest pro-constitutional revisionist, rightist group Nippon Kaigi (Japan Conference) planned to begin on October 8 in Sapporo City was cancelled, Akahata reported on October 4.

Nippon Kaigi originally planned to hold the panel exhibition for two months from September in the city’s major underground walkway connecting Odori Subway Station to Sapporo Subway Station (Chi-Ka-Ho).

In protest against the planned exhibition, an anti-racist group called “Counter-Racist Action Collective (C.R.A.C) North” in August submitted an open letter to the Sapporo City government and the Chi-Ka-Ho operator. In the following month, the group filed a petition demanding that the city authority withdraw its approval for the exhibition. However, the event began on September 16, displaying panels full of disinformation about the Ainu, such as these: “Indigenous Ainu people were civilized by the Wajin” (the Ainu-called people from the mainland of Japan), and “The Ainu people were given favorable treatment.”

Soon after the panel exhibition started, the C.R.A.C North launched an online signature campaign calling for the withdrawal of the city government’s approval for the exhibition. In addition, the Japanese Communist Party Sapporo City Assemblymembers’ group at an assembly meeting at the end of September grilled City Mayor Akimoto Katsuhiro about his stance toward this issue.

Under this situation, it was reported that the Chi-Ka-Ho operator decided to cancel the controversial exhibition in October.