Japanese official criticized for flood piggyback ride

A Japanese minister has apologized after a senior government official hitched a piggyback ride on a colleague’s back while on a visit to a town that was devastated by a storm.

TV footage of Shunsuke Mutai, the vice minister of reconstruction, being held aloft to evade a puddle in northern town of Iwaizumi attracted criticism on social media.

More than 20 people in the region died in the storm earlier this month.

Reconstruction Minister Masahiro Imamura apologized to locals during the weekend and said that Mutai had forgotten to bring rubber boots.

“When I heard the story, I said what on earth was he doing,” Imamura said, according to the Associated Press.

In July, Lydia Cumming, a Mexican reporter, sparked a series of memes on social media with the hashtag #LadyReportera after she was photographed being carried through floodwater by two locals in the central city of Puebla.

She was fired by fired by her employer TV Azteca for a “lack of respect shown towards neighbors.”