The head of the Osaka Prefectural Assembly decided Monday to delete from the minutes a remark by a member that Korean, Vietnamese and Chinese outfits worn by some students at a high school graduation ceremony made him think he was in a nightclub.
Yoshikazu Kamanaka made the decision at the request of Hiroshi Yagi of the governing Liberal Democratic Party, who made the remark, the assembly's secretariat said.
The secretariat also said Yagi apologized to Kamanaka for the remark, which triggered protests from the Osaka High School Teachers Union.
In asking a question during Friday's plenary session at the assembly pertaining to appointing members of the private sector as high school principals, Yagi described a graduation ceremony at a prefectural high school in the city of Osaka.
"The graduating students were wearing 'chogori,' 'ao dai' and Chinese dress," he said. "I felt as if I was coming into a nightclub."
The chogori is a traditional Korean dress for women and the ao dai is a traditional Vietnamese dress.
The teacher union called the remark a serious violation of the students' human rights.
The secretariat said that after Kamanaka announced that the remarks would be deleted from the minutes, some assembly members from other parties, including New Komeito, the LDP's ruling coalition partner, protested, saying the issue runs too deep to solve with a simple deletion.