YouTuber-Turned-Lawmaker Sacked for Never Showing Up For Work

A Japanese politician who had not shown up to Parliament since getting elected in July has been expelled, the government said on Wednesday.

51-year-old Yoshikazu Higashitani, who goes by his YouTube moniker GaaSyy, is known for gossiping about celebrities on his channels, which had more than 1.2 million subscribers before YouTube permanently suspended his accounts for allegedly violating its user guidelines. 

Despite campaigning entirely online from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, GaaSyy was elected into Japan’s 248-strong House of Councillors, the upper house of parliament, in July. He ran on the NHK Party ticket, a single-issue party which calls for eliminating the fees the Japanese government charges to fund its public broadcaster. Takashi Tachibana, the party’s founder, is a former NHK employee who wants to abolish the license fee system used to fund the broadcaster, believing it should operate like any other subscription channel.

But even after winning the election, GaaSyy never came home. It’s mandatory for Japan’s lawmakers to attend parliament sessions, but the lawmaker said he wouldn’t return to Japan because he fears getting arrested over allegations of fraud and defamation made against him by celebrities. 

In December, Tokyo police asked GaaSyy to volunteer for questioning after receiving multiple complaints that he defamed and threatened public figures on his social media accounts. On Jan. 11, Tokyo police raided several locations with ties to GaaSyy to investigate the claims. GaaSyy did not immediately respond to VICE World News’ request for comment, but has previously called the criminal complaints “false.”

The culmination of weeks of complaints by his former colleagues, the expulsion is the first time in 72 years that a Japanese parliament member has been booted out.

Since he entered office, lawmakers have repeatedly called for GaaSyy to return to the country. The public has also voiced anger at him taking more than 19 million yen ($141,120) in salary and bonuses since his election, despite never showing up for work. 

In early March, his party was renamed the Seijika Joshi 48 Party—its eighth relabeling since it was founded in 2013. The new name, which roughly translates to Female Politicians 48 Party, was chosen because Japan lacks young women in politics, Tachibana claimed in a video, and the 48 is taken from popular girl idol groups such as AKB48. 

Though GaaSyy isn’t known for his substantive political platform, his supporters hoped his maverick streak would expose secrets from within Japan’s political establishment. His online presence was also engaging, having far more subscribers than the ruling party’s YouTube channel. 

Last week, the upper house asked GaaSyy to apologize, in person, during a plenary session for his absence—the third most severe punishment a lawmaker can receive. But the lawmaker didn’t show up, saying that he had already apologized in a video he previously sent. Parliament didn’t accept the footage because it wasn’t in person. 

In an interview on Tuesday, a day before his expulsion was made official, GaaSyy apologized to the nearly 290,000 people who voted him into office. 

“I’m really sorry that I was fired from my position as a member of the National Assembly before I could achieve anything,” he said over video call. 

Follow Hanako Montgomery on Twitter and Instagram.