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.
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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.
Year-end bonuses down 9.3% on year
Average year-end bonuses paid to workers at businesses with at least five employees declined last year by a record 9.3 percent from the previous year to less than 400,000 yen, the labor ministry said Wednesday.
The average year-end bonus stood at 380,258 yen, marking the first time it has fallen under 400,000 yen since the survey was first taken in its current format in 1990.
“Businesses whose earnings have deteriorated amid the economic slowdown in the aftermath of the collapse of Lehman Brothers are reducing their bonus payments to workers,” a Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry official said.
Workers in the manufacturing industry received an average 437,406 yen year-end bonus, down 14.8 percent from the previous year; service sector workers took home an average 315,877 yen, down 12.8 percent; and wholesale and retail sector workers got 277,112 yen, a reduction of 11 percent.
The nationwide survey was taken at about 33,000 business establishments.
Layoffs to affect 270,000 nonregular workers by June
The period between October 2008 and this June will see 4,955 employers shed 269,790 nonregular jobs, a March labor ministry survey showed Tuesday.
The figure, including workers whose labor contracts with manpower agencies were not renewed after expiration, increased by 7,192 from the previous survey in February, the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry said.
A ministry official said employment conditions are improving, but there is a need to monitor developments at the end of March, when more companies are expected to let labor contracts with temporary workers expire.
By prefecture, Aichi, the home of Toyota Motor Corp. and many of its parts suppliers, topped the list with 44,525 nonregular workers losing or expected to lose their jobs, followed by Tokyo with 15,932, Nagano with 11,150 and Shizuoka with 11,128.
The survey was compiled with data available as of March 18.
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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Foreign trio clear nursing exam hurdle
Two nurses from Indonesia and one from the Philippines cleared Japanese-language requirements and passed the national nursing exam in February, the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry said Friday.
The three, who are among 257 people in Japan under free-trade agreements with Indonesia and the Philippines, will be allowed to stay in Japan indefinitely.
The three were the first applicants to pass Japan’s nursing qualification exam among hundreds of foreign nurses in the country under FTAs.
The two Indonesians, who have been in Japan since 2008, are working at a hospital in Sanjo, Niigata Prefecture.
The Filipino nurse has been working at a hospital in Ashikaga, Tochigi Prefecture, since arriving in Japan last year.
Japan, a rapidly aging society, began accepting foreign nurses and caregivers in 2008 due to domestic labor shortages in medical and nursing service fields.
Foreign nurses are required to return to their home countries if they fail to pass the nurses exam within three years. Caregivers also need to clear Japan’s qualifying exam within four years.
None of the foreign nurses passed last year’s national exams held in February 2009 because, it is thought, kanji and technical terms used in the exam pose a major challenge for foreign nurses.
In talks with Indonesian and Philippine government officials in January, Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada promised to consider addressing the language barriers for foreign nurses.
The health ministry is currently studying using simpler terms in the exam and helping foreign nurses study the Japanese language, ministry officials said.
In the 2008 and 2009 fiscal years through this month, Japan accepted 570 health care workers from Indonesia — 277 nurses and 293 caregivers.
3 foreigners pass tough nursing exam
Two Indonesians and one Filipina have become the first among hundreds of applicants from their countries to pass Japan’s state nursing examination, the health ministry said Friday.
Yared Febrian Fernandes and Ria Agustina, both 26 from Indonesia, and Lalin Ever Gammed, 34, from the Philippines, were among 47,340 people, including Japanese, to pass this year.
The three are the first successful applicants from Indonesia and the Philippines since Japan began accepting nursing applicants in 2008 and 2009 under economic partnership agreements (EPAs).
The examination is conducted in Japanese, and 251 other would-be nurses from Indonesia and the Philippines failed this year’s test.
There were 82 applicants from Indonesia last year. None were successful.
Indonesians and Filipinos who are qualified as nurses in their home countries can only work in Japan in limited trainee nurse roles and must pass the state exam within three years. Failure means they have to return to their home countries.
The two Indonesians are training at Sannocho Hospital in Sanjo, Niigata Prefecture. They told a news conference that they were relieved and happy to pass.
Gammed is at Ashikaga Red Cross Hospital in Ashikaga, Tochigi Prefecture.