Governor Koike says he will correct the “black box”… Projection mapping disclosures are “almost blacked out”.

The person who applied, the person who approved, the person responsible for the bid… all “the same person”!

The person who applied, the person who approved, and the person in charge of the bidding are all the same person. Is such a strange thing possible? It’s not really a bidding process at all, is it?

These are the astonishing words of Mr. Taka1984, whose X-account name is “Taka1984,” which were discovered through a request for disclosure of bidding documents for the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s two-year, approximately 4.8 billion yen project for the Tokyo Projection Mapping Project.

The projection mapping project, which uses the exterior walls of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building and other buildings to project images, has been criticized on social networking sites as “wasteful,” “vulgar,” “looks like a newly opened pachinko parlor,” and “even though a soup kitchen for the needy is being set up near the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.

Where in the world is the 4.8 billion yen being spent?

The breakdown of the 4.8 billion yen announced by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government is as follows: 1.65 billion yen for the metropolitan government building (PM) project (700 million yen in FY 2011 and 950 million yen in FY 2012), 2.04 billion yen for the PM development project in cooperation with the private sector (1.05 billion yen and 990 million yen, respectively), 960 million yen for the PM International Award Project (480 million yen and 480 million yen, respectively), and the Tokyo PM Promotion Support Council 200 million yen (060 million yen and 140 million yen, respectively). But these are rough amounts by location, not the “breakdown” that Tokyo residents want to know.

Incidentally, it was learned in an interview and report by “Good Travel News” in March of this year that this project is being managed by “Dentsu Live,” a “Dentsu” group company that is currently under suspension from bidding by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government until August ’24. So how were the orders placed with Dentsu Live and how were the amounts determined?

Taka1984 requested disclosure of the information, and what came to light was the shocking fact as described in the beginning of this article.

In the document “Amendment to the Agreement on the Implementation of Projection Mapping, etc. Utilizing the Walls of Buildings, etc.,” the Executive Committee applied for and received approval from the “Bureau of Industrial and Labor Affairs.

In addition, the document “Concerning the Implementation of the Planning and Selection Committee for the Outsourcing of Video Production, etc. for Projection Mapping at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building in Reiwa 2023” lists Kazuhiro Mukai, Chairman of the Tokyo Projection Mapping Executive Committee, as the “Decision-Making Authority”. Furthermore, the selection committee members include the head of the Tourism Department of the Bureau of Industrial and Labor Affairs of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. The director of the Tourism Department at that time was Mr. Kazuhiro Mukai.

Mr. Mukai, who was the chairman of the executive committee and the director of the Tourism Department at the time, was also the chairman of the bidding committee. The person with the decision-making authority to decide on the bidding was the executive committee chairman himself.

Moreover, among the five members of the selection committee were two chiefs of the Tourism Department of the Bureau of Industrial and Labor Affairs of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. Including Mr. Mukai, three of the five members of the bid selection committee are related to the Tourism Department. Incidentally, the other two members who were not disclosed are said to be outside experts.

We have filed various disclosure requests with the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, but this is the first time that the person who filed the request, the person who approved it, and the person in charge of the bidding process are all the same person,” said Mr. Mukai.

Actually, Taka1984 is a “male in his 30s (at the time) in the disclosure request cluster” who provided information to FRIDAY Digital in a previous article, “Disclosure request reveals that the Tokyo Metropolitan Government ignored 350,000 ‘signatures opposing the Olympics'” (July 2, 2009), and is also a member of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s English He is the same person who continues to investigate the validity of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s English Speaking Test (EAST-J), the TOKYO Monument, and other items through disclosure requests.

Bid deliberation is “10 minutes”!

Taka1984 was not satisfied with the bidding documents for the projection mapping project.

The two companies involved in the bidding process were Dentsu Live and Hakuhodo Products, but they deliberated for only 10 minutes.

In the past, when we have made various disclosure requests, such as for English speaking tests, the time schedule for the bidding process has sometimes come up, but all of them took 20 to 30 minutes. （I don’t think 10 minutes of review (by committee members alone) is usually possible.”

Like Dentsu Live, another company that participated in the bidding process, Hakuhodo Products, is also a Hakuhodo group company whose bidding qualifications were suspended until August of this year due to the Olympics bid-rigging scandal, which is also a point of concern.

What is curious is that even the overall concept page of the presentation materials for Dentsu Live, which received the order, is undisclosed.

They say it is because it is corporate know-how, but the projection mapping is actually already underway and the deliverables are already available, so it doesn’t make sense to hide the concept now.

There are no “minutes”!

There is a further problem that Taka1984 questions.

He said, “There is one crucial item in the disclosed bid documents: there are no minutes. Even the English speaking test, which is full of blackouts, has minutes.

Some minutes are not disclosed because, for example, they prevent active opinions from being expressed. But in this case, they are not even undisclosed, so I think they are ‘non-existent.

Is it possible that there is no record at all of how the bids were decided? Was there really any deliberation between the two companies in the 10 minutes? One might even speculate that there may have been collusion.

Incidentally, Kazuhiro Mukai, who was the chairman of the Projection Mapping Executive Committee and the head of the Tourism Department at the time of the bidding in Reiwa 2024, was replaced by Nobuhiko Emura in 2024. taka1984 commented, “Since the personnel change was not announced at the beginning of the fiscal year, I assume it was a mid-year replacement, but I found it strange. I thought it was a strange change in the middle of the fiscal year,” said Taka1984.

Although the total amount was given, the unit price for each was listed as “one set,” and all were undisclosed.

The breakdown is not given because it is considered know-how related to competition, but in fact, it would be better for the Tokyo Metropolitan Government to show specifically how much the order was placed to dispel the distrust of the public.

I suspect that they are doing this to hide the fact that if there is some discrepancy, it would be bad if the amount of money is revealed.”

By the way, “disclosure requests” are basically only available to administrative agencies and independent administrative corporations, and when the subject is the “Executive Committee,” including those related to the Olympics, the request is not effective, and the information tends to remain in the dark.

In such a situation, the fact that the information was disclosed this time is said to be due to irregular circumstances.

The Tokyo Projection Mapping Executive Committee is actually set up within the Tourism Department of the Bureau of Industrial and Labor Affairs of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, but ostensibly it is a separate entity.

Therefore, when we first requested disclosure of materials from the Tourism Department, the request was turned down once because the amounts and contractual relationships were with the Executive Committee, so the request for disclosure was not covered.

So, even though we did not know the amount of money, we were looking for any documents related to the Tourism Department, and we found that the Tourism Department was listed as the submitter of the commission instructions to the contractor on the website, and we made a disclosure request to the Tourism Department.

From there, we withdrew our request to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government and submitted another request to the Executive Committee, and this is the first time the information was disclosed.

The response from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government was…

The details of the amount of money were not known, and the important details were full of “undisclosed” information. FRIDAY Digital asked the following questions to the “Tokyo Night & Light Office” and the Tourism Department of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s Bureau of Industry and Tourism about the discomfort we found in the bidding process.

• (1) Whether or not there are minutes of the bidding process
• (2) The timing of the personnel change that replaced Kazuhiro Mukai as the executive committee chairman
• (3) Whether or not the 2023 version of the “Project Report and Statement of Accounts for the Implementation of Projection Mapping Using the Walls of Buildings” and the “Statement of Settlement of Contributions for the Implementation of Projection Mapping Using the Walls of Buildings” were available to the public.

However, the only response we received was (2), “The current executive committee chairperson assumed office in November Reiwa 2023.” The other two questions were not addressed at all, and we received only a release (see image) as a “response.

What is the reason for hiding even the existence of the minutes of the bidding process? How is it possible for them not to disclose the statement of accounts for income and expenses and settlement of contributions, which had been disclosed in the previous fiscal year? Also, why was the executive committee chairman replaced in November in the middle of the fiscal year? ……

Tokyo Projection Mapping continues to face a lot of criticism, but it continues to avoid answering the questions and remains unclear.

Click here for ” taka1984 ‘s” NOTE