The Japanese Senate expels the “YouTuber” from the House for being absent from work

The Disciplinary Commission of the Japanese Assembly decided on Tuesday to expel Senator Yoshikazu Higashitani, a well-known youtuber under the pseudonym GaaSyy, due to constant absenteeism, having not held office at any time since he was elected in July.

“The committee reached this conclusion after discussing it with regard to the importance of the democratic electoral process (…) GaaSyy does not understand the basics of democracy, based on laws and rules,” said the president of this disciplinary committee of the Senate, Muneo Suzuki.

The decision counted on unanimous support of the government and the opposition and it will become official today at the Senate session, which will end the short eight-month political career of GaaSyya, who has already protested against this measure, because it was contrary to the will of his constituents.

It’s about the first expulsion of a congressman from the Diet – the Japanese Senate – since 1951 and the third under the current Constitution drawn up after World War II, points out the Japanese media who consider GaaSyya an anomaly within the country’s politics due to his past of addiction and debauchery before he became a ‘YouTuber’.

Higashitani, who has not set foot in the Senate since being elected, has been in recent months from Japan due to fear, he claims, of being arrested while he was under investigation for alleged intimidation and defamation of celebrities on his YouTube channel, which was shut down after he was elected senator.

His popularity on the Internet has gathered more than 1.3 million subscribers, attracted the attention of the NHK partya populist formation that got its name from the only topic that appeared in its political program, the revision of the fees of the public broadcaster NHK.

A week ago, the party changed its name to Seijika Joshi 48. It has two seats in the Senate and is expected to replace Higashitani with the third most votes on the list.