With the recession taking a particularly heavy toll on migrant communities, many schools for children of Japanese-Brazilian and other backgrounds have closed their doors after struggling through falling enrollments and nonpayment of fees.
The closures have forced many children of migrants to enter the public school system, a daunting prospect for those whose entire schooling has been conducted in another language and who don’t speak Japanese at home.
To help them better integrate into the public school system, the education ministry launched the “Rainbow Bridge classroom” project last fall, providing additional Japanese-language instruction.
But the ministry is struggling to win over migrant parents, many of whom resist the idea of sending their children to Japanese schools.
There were about 90 Brazilian schools across the country at the end of 2008. The number had fallen to around 60 this February. Many parents lost their jobs, leaving them unable to pay their children’s tuition. Others returned with their families to their home countries.
The Colegio Brasil Japao, a Brazilian school in Minato Ward, Nagoya, had 80 students at the end of 2008, but the number dropped to 49 at the end of last year. Each month, 10 to 20 students failed to pay a monthly fee of about ¥30,000, forcing the school to post a monthly loss of around ¥800,000.
“We have tried our best, but there is a limit to what we can endure,” said the school’s principal, Carlos Shinoda, at a January meeting to notify guardians of the suspension of some classes.
None of the parents said they wanted to send their children to Japanese schools.
Yojiro Arlindo Ogasawara, 40, whose three children attend the Brazilian school, said, “If they attend a Japanese school, they will be left behind academically while trying to learn the Japanese language.”
He continued to send his children to the school, even after losing his job, because he said his eldest son had been bullied at a Japanese nursery school, where he was told, “Foreigners are stupid.”
Many guardians are worried that their children will be treated only as “guests” in public school classrooms unless they know the Japanese language.
“Enrolling in Japanese schools is the last resort,” said a 38-year-old mother. “I would like to continue to send my daughter to a classroom where the atmosphere is warm.”
Thirty-two organizations, including boards of education and nonprofit organizations, were running Rainbow Bridge classrooms in Ibaraki, Gunma, Saitama, Kanagawa, Yamanashi, Nagano, Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Mie, Shiga and Okayama prefectures as of February, to teach Japanese to foreign children. Portuguese lessons are also offered.
“Public schools are given the cold shoulder by foreigners because of experiences and rumors of bullying,” said Akio Nakayama, representative in Japan of the International Organization for Migration, which is promoting the project at the request of the education ministry. “A coordinator at each classroom is visiting families to urge them to take part in the class.”
Besides Brazilians, there are foreign children who can’t attend public schools because they require special assistance, and even if they are enrolled in such schools many refuse to attend.
Although the Rainbow Bridge role in classrooms is becoming increasingly important, Nakayama pointed to the need for schools to do more to assist foreign children.
“In addition to the creation of a framework by Japanese public schools to receive and support foreign children, roles like the one performed by coordinators at Rainbow Bridge classrooms should be institutionalized,” he said.
Such classrooms accept not only Brazilian but also other foreign children.
Immigration
Group: Hunger strike worked
Supporters of inmates held at the Nishi-Nihon Japan Immigration Center said a hunger strike in March has led to more provisional releases for those with health problems.
But immigration center officials denied any connection between the hunger strike and the provisional releases.
About 70 male inmates began a hunger strike March 8, demanding that those with serious health problems be given provisional releases to receive medical care.
A citizens group aiding the inmates said that after the hunger strike, a Pakistani man whose weight had plummeted due to depression and fever was granted a provisional release.
Another Pakistani man taken to a hospital in December after falling unconscious from extremely high blood pressure was also told he would be given a provisional release.
The two had been confined at the immigration center for over a year. The support group had been requesting a provisional release for them since late last year because of their failing health. The request was initially rejected in February.
Japanese firms adopt a global appearance
With overseas markets increasingly seen as the key to their survival, Japanese companies are adopting a more “international” look at home involving changes that would have been unheard of years ago.
[A few] long-held practices in hiring have been scrapped, as have [some] limits on positions available to non-Japanese at the companies’ head offices in Tokyo and other Japanese cities.
Currently, nearly 140,000 foreign nationals work at businesses in Japan.
According to a labor ministry-commissioned survey conducted by the Fujitsu Research Institute on about 800 companies from September through October last year, nearly 40 percent of those companies have hired foreigners with high-level knowledge and skills, including engineers, in recent years.
But 58 companies have suspended their employment of foreigners, showing that language barrier and corporate culture clashes remain a potential problem.
In a country where company loyalty remains relatively strong, 25 percent of those companies said they stopped hiring foreigners because previous hires had left for other companies offering better working conditions.
In addition, 20 percent said they lacked supervisors who could work effectively with the foreign employees.
But the trend has been to expand hiring of non-Japanese as the domestic market shrinks and the declining birthrate is expected to lead to a huge shortage in demand in future years.
Meanwhile, Internet shopping site operator Rakuten Inc. regards 2010 as the year to develop into a truly global company.
In February, Rakuten began distributing papers written in English instead of Japanese at its Monday morning executive meetings, a policy that soon covered meetings attended by all employees.
And in March, the dozens of participants at the executive meetings were required to speak in English.
Rakuten assigns graduates of overseas universities to technological divisions in which they are required to improve their Japanese-language skills and learn in-house culture.
Those non-Japanese are expected to eventually play key roles in Rakuten’s offices overseas.
Indonesians seek flexibility in exam for foreign nurses
Indonesia’s nursing association has called on the Japanese government to be more flexible in the national nursing exam so more foreign nurses can pass it and work in the nation.
Achir Yani, president of the Indonesian National Nurses’ Association, made the call following a recent announcement by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry that only three nurses — two from Indonesia and one from the Philippines — passed this year’s exam.
They were among 254 foreigners who took the exam in February and are the first successful applicants. Last year, none of the 82 foreign applicants passed.
Yani said the two Indonesians — Yared Febrian Fernandes and Ria Agustina, both 26 — have proved that “what is impossible is now possible,” referring to how difficult the exam is.
The Japanese-language requirement and technical terms used in the exam are thought to pose a high hurdle for foreign nurses.
“I myself am not satisfied because I know that (Indonesian applicants) are very competent, but the language (requirement) has made them fail,” Yani said.
During an ongoing survey her association is conducting in cooperation with a Japanese university, the professor at the University of Indonesia said the nurses expressed a wish that “furigana,” a kanji pronunciation aid, be allowed.
They also requested four chances to take the exam, instead of three, considering the first opportunity comes only six months after their training.
“So, for sure, they are not going to make it,” Yani said.
She expressed concern that unless the government accepts the requests of the foreign applicants, Indonesian nurses, especially those who have not been recruited yet, will be discouraged.
She also suggested that hospitals in Japan take note of the efforts made by the hospital where Fernandes and Agustina work to support them in their Japanese-language study.
Both women came to Japan from Indonesia in 2008 and are working at a hospital in Sanjo, Niigata Prefecture.
“That can be a lesson learned by other hospitals so their nurses will also be able to pass the exam with the support they have,” Yani said, adding it is her understanding that numerous hospitals in Japan appreciate the contributions of their Indonesian nurses and want them to become registered nurses.
Japan began accepting foreign nurses and caregivers in 2008 to address labor shortages in the medical and nursing service fields.
Foreign nurses are required to return to their home countries if they fail to pass the nurse qualifying exam within three years. Caregivers need to clear the qualifying exam within four years.
In talks with Indonesian and Philippine officials in January, Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada promised to consider addressing the language barrier for foreign nurses.
The health ministry is now studying the use of simpler terms in the exam and helping foreign nurses study the Japanese language, officials said.
In the 2008 and 2009 fiscal years through last Wednesday, Japan accepted 277 nurses and 293 caregivers from Indonesia. In 2009, 280 health care workers came to Japan from the Philippines.
Korean worker who sued Tokyo govt retires
Public health nurse Chong Hyang Gyun was all smiles when she retired from the Tokyo metropolitan government recently, even though it had refused to let her seek promotion because of her South Korean nationality.
A second-generation Korean resident of this country, Chong sued the metropolitan government in 1994, demanding she be allowed to take a promotion exam for a managerial post. The trial went on for 10 years of Chong’s 22-year career with the metropolitan government.
Ultimately, Chong was not able to be promoted because the Supreme Court overturned her victory in a lower court. Upon her retirement, however, she smiled and said, “I have no regrets.”
Chong officially retired Wednesday, as she had reached her mandatory retirement age of 60.
Chong was born in Iwate Prefecture. In 1988, she was hired as the first non-Japanese public health nurse to work for the metropolitan government.
Her application to take the internal exam to become a manager was refused, however, because of the metropolitan government’s “nationality clause,” which prohibits the appointment of non-Japanese employees to managerial posts.
The Tokyo District Court decided against her in 1996, ruling that the metropolitan government’s action was constitutional.
In 1997, the Tokyo High Court ruled that the metropolitan government’s decision violated the Constitution, which guarantees the freedom to choose one’s occupation, and ordered the Tokyo government to pay compensation to Chong.
The metropolitan government appealed this decision and in 2005, the Supreme Court nullified the high court ruling and rejected Chong’s demand.
After Chong openly expressed her disappointment at a press conference about the Supreme Court ruling, she received critical e-mails and other messages. Chong also said she sometimes felt it was hard to stay in her workplace.
However, a sizable number of her colleagues and area residents understood her feelings.
“I was supported by many people. I enjoyed my job,” Chong said.
For two years from 2006, Chong worked on Miyakejima island, helping residents deal with difficulties resulting from their prolonged evacuation.
Just before her retirement, Chong visited health care centers in Tokyo and other related facilities as chief of a section for preventing infectious diseases and caring for mentally handicapped people.
She was rehired from April as a nonregular employee at her workplace’s request, but she will work fewer days.
“I’ve been tense ever since filing the lawsuit, trying not to make any mistakes in other areas. Now I can finally relax,” Chong said.
Chong recently has been interested in supporting Indonesian nurse candidates in Japan. During the New Year holidays, she held a gathering to introduce them to Japanese culture.
“Now that a greater number of foreigners are in Japan, society as a whole should think about how to assimilate them,” Chong said.
She said she believed her lawsuit has helped raise those kind of questions.
Migrants in Japan facing discrimination
Migrants in Japan face discrimination, exploitation and other forms of mistreatment, an independent United Nations human rights expert said, urging the Japanese Government to strengthen their protection.
“They [migrants] still face a range of challenges, including racism and discrimination, exploitation, a tendency by the judiciary and police to ignore their rights, and the overall lack of a comprehensive immigration policy that incorporates human rights protection,” said Jorge A. Bustamante, UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, at the end of a nine-day visit to Japan on Wednesday.
Bustamante praised some of the measures taken by the Government to alleviate the impact of the economic crisis on migrants and their children.
However, he stressed that “Japan has yet to adopt a comprehensive immigration policy that provides for the protection of migrants’ rights,” 20 years after it started receiving migrant workers.
“Japan should establish institutionalized programmes designed to create the necessary conditions for the integration of migrants into Japanese society and the respect of their rights, including to work, health, housing and education, without discrimination,” Bustamante said.
“Racism and discrimination based on nationality are still too common in Japan, including in the workplace, in schools, in healthcare establishments and housing,” he added.
Existing general provisions are not effective in protecting foreign residents from discrimination based on race and nationality, he said.
Bustamante expressed concern about the policy of detaining irregular migrants, including asylum-seekers, parents and children, for prolonged periods, in some cases for as long as three years, saying that practice amounted to a “de facto indefinite detention.”
“Clear criteria should be established in order to limit detention to the cases where it is strictly necessary, avoiding detaining persons such as those who are ill or who are the parents of minor children,” the human rights expert said.
“A maximum period of detention pending deportation should be set, after which foreigners should be released.”
The Special Rapporteur also drew attention to the high incidence of domestic violence against migrant women and their children.
“Appropriate policies to protect and assist single mothers and their children who find themselves in this extremely vulnerable situation are lacking and should be adopted and implemented urgently,” he said.
Noting that a considerable number of migrant children in Japan do not attend school, Bustamante said that “governmental efforts should be increased to facilitate that foreign children study either in Japanese or foreign schools, and learn Japanese.”
During his mission, the independent expert heard many cases where parents of children born in Japan or who have lived there for up to 15 years have been recently deported or detained, resulting in the children being separated from their parents because of their irregular residence status. “In accordance with the principle of the best interest of the child, families should not be separated,” he said.
The Special Rapporteur will later this year present to the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council a complete report on his visit, with his observations and recommendations.
An expert from Mexico on international migration, Bustamante was appointed as Special Rapporteur by the former Commission on Human Rights in 2005.
Protests hit immigration detainee treatment
Some 30 Japanese, Chinese, Ghanaian and ethnic Kurds from Turkey staged protests Wednesday in front of the Tokyo Regional Immigration Bureau in Shinagawa Ward and the Justice Ministry in Chiyoda Ward, demanding better treatment for detainees.
Masanori Kashiwazaki, a member of SYI, a group supporting foreigners detained in immigration detention centers, gave identical protest letters to Shinagawa Immigration Bureau Director Shigeru Takaya and Justice Minister Keiko Chiba.
The protests were called after 70 detainees at the West Japan Immigration Control Center went on an 11-day hunger strike in early March, protesting alleged inhumane treatment by center officials.
“Give me back my father,” an ethnic Kurdish boy from Turkey shouted via a bullhorn during the protest in front of the immigration facility where his father is being held.
In the letters, the SYI demanded that the center stop violent and repressive treatment of detainees. They also urged the Immigration Bureau to investigate and disclose the cause of the death of a Ghanaian man aboard an airplane that was about to leave Narita airport on March 22 as the illegal resident was being deported to his home country.
Immigration officers reportedly overpowered the Ghanaian, who was allegedly acting violent.
“We want to encourage detainees by taking action. We want to send a message that they are not alone,” Kashiwazaki said.
“We heard immigration officers commit violence against detainees. But we don’t know what’s really going on. The thing is that the Immigration Bureau is very secretive. Detainees may receive harsher treatment than prisoners,” he said.
U.N. rights rapporteur says end foreign trainee program ‘slavery’
A visiting U.N. expert on the rights of migrants urged the government Wednesday to terminate its industrial trainee and technical intern program for workers from overseas, saying it may amount to “slavery” in some cases, fueling demand for exploitative cheap labor in possible violation of human rights.
“This program should be discontinued and replaced by an employment program,” Jorge Bustamante, U.N. special rapporteur on human rights of migrants, told reporters at the U.N. Information Center in Tokyo.
While praising some government measures to alleviate the impact of the economic crisis on the foreign population, Bustamante noted the country still faces a range of challenges, including racism, discrimination and exploitation of migrants, based on information provided by civil society.
“Racism and discrimination based on nationality are still too common in Japan, including in the workplace, in schools, in health care establishments and housing,” he said.
“Japan should adopt specific legislation on the prevention and elimination of racial discrimination, since the current general provisions included in the Constitution and existing laws are not effective in protecting foreign residents from discrimination based on race and nationality,” Bustamante said.
Since his arrival in the country on March 23 for an official inspection, Bustamante has interviewed migrants and their families, including Filipinos and Brazilians in Nagoya, and discussed the issues with ministry and agency officials.
Japanese civic groups supporting migrants said it is significant that a U.N. expert has conducted an assessment of human rights of migrants in Japan, which has yet to ratify the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.
He will submit a report on his visit to the U.N. Human Rights Council to present his findings, conclusions and recommendations possibly in September or October after submitting a draft to the Japanese government.
Following a series of meetings and discussions he has held in the country, Bustamante pointed out that a number of parents of Japanese-born children or those who have lived in the country for a long time have been deported or detained due to their irregular residence status.
“In accordance with the principle of the best interest of the child, families should not be separated,” he said.
Assigned in July 2005 to the post created in 1999, Bustamante’s main responsibilities include examining ways of overcoming obstacles to the protection of migrants’ human rights.
Deportation rule troubles U.N. official
A recent government decision to deport only the parents of families without residency status, thus separating children from their mothers and fathers, flies in the face of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Jorge Bustamante, the United Nations special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, said Saturday in Tokyo.
Bustamante, who is on his first official fact-finding mission to Japan, is meeting with government officials, nongovernmental organizations, legal experts and foreign residents, and is expected to submit a report on Japan to the U.N. Commission on Human Rights.
On Saturday, he met with residents caught in the deportation dilemma — among them Noriko Calderon, a 14-year-old girl who was born in Japan to an undocumented Filipino couple. Calderon’s case drew media attention when her parents were deported last spring.
“It is very difficult to live separated from my parents, and I miss them very much,” Calderon said. “But I hope that one day, all three of us can live in Japan together and I plan to do my best” to realize that goal.
Bustamante expressed concern over the separation of families and said he would cite the situation in his report.
“It’s going to be made public,” Bustamante told the gathering. “And this, of course, might result in an embarrassment for the government of Japan and therefore certain pressure (will be) put on the government of Japan.”
Five families, including the Calderons, have faced this ultimatum, according to lawyers supporting their cause.
“My role is not to make a judgment — my role is to report,” Bustamante said. “But what I hear is something that could be described as actions of the government that imply not a clear abiding by the international rules of law.”
Another to meet with the U.N. special rapporteur was a Peruvian-born 16-year-old girl who has lived in Japan most of her life. The girl, whose name was withheld, told Bustamante that while she realizes that they do not have legal status in Japan, neither she nor her brothers and sisters speak Spanish and have no knowledge of Peru.
“If we go back to Peru, no future awaits us,” the girl said. “We are reaching our limits mentally as well as financially . . . (but) I will never give up hope and do my best till the end to keep living in Japan.”
1st foreign nurses pass national exam
Two Indonesians and one Filipina have become the first foreign nurses to pass Japan’s national nursing qualification test after work experience at Japanese hospitals under economic partnership agreements, the health ministry said Friday.
The three are among the 370 foreign nurses who have visited this country under an EPA-related project launched in fiscal 2008, hoping to pass the nursing exam after receiving Japanese-language training and gaining working experience under the supervision of Japanese nurses.
In 2009, 82 foreign nurses took the exam, but all failed. This year, 254 such nurses applied for the test, with the two Indonesians and one Filipina passing it, according to the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry.
The Indonesians came to Japan in August 2008, and both work at a hospital in Niigata Prefecture. The Filipina, who arrived in Japan last May, works at a Tochigi Prefecture hospital.
Foreign nurses who come to this country under economic partnership agreements are required to possess nursing qualifications in their own nations. After taking language training, they seek to pass Japan’s nursing test while working as assistant nurses at hospitals in this country.
They are required to pass the test within three years of arriving in Japan. For foreign nurses who came to Japan in fiscal 2008, next year’s exam will be the last opportunity to qualify as nurses in this country.
Foreign nurses wishing to gain qualifications in Japan are required to take the same exam as Japanese applicants. Technical terms used in the test pose a hurdle for them in accomplishing their aim, observers said.
This year, about 90 percent of Japanese applicants passed the test. This figure stood at only 1.2 percent for foreign nurses who arrived in Japan under the EPA program.
To rectify the situation, the ministry is considering replacing technical terms with easier-to-understand language in next year’s exam.
More language help neededIt is essential to improve the current Japanese-language training system for foreign nurses seeking to pass this nation’s nursing qualification test under the EPA project, observers said.
Foreign nurses take six months of language training after coming to this country. However, nurses at Japanese hospitals that host them, as well as volunteers who work to aid them, have complained that they have been left to teach the foreign nurses practical Japanese needed for their work at medical institutions.
It is also necessary to ensure foreign nurses are fully trained in using Japanese before arriving in this country, while also increasing the number of opportunities for them to take the national exam, observers said.
In fiscal 2008, the first batch of 98 foreign nurses came to Japan under the EPA program, including the two Indonesians who passed this year’s test. If anyone from the group fails to pass next year’s exam, he or she must return home.
If no one from the first group–excluding the Indonesians–passes the test, it means most foreign nurses in the group must return home despite their three-year work experience at Japanese hospitals.
Such a scenario could reduce the EPA project to an empty slogan. Still, foreign nurses must be able to communicate their ideas in Japanese to doctors and patients. This presents the greatest dilemma for the EPA program, according to observers.
With this in mind, the government should consider corrective measures, including an improvement in the Japanese-language training system for foreign nurses and an extension of their stay in this nation, observers said.
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