Protesters ‘flip the bird’ at Justice Ministry over forced fingerprinting

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Protestors inflated a 3-meter-high yellow hand with an extended forefinger and thrust it toward the Justice Ministry’s offices in Tokyo on Tuesday to demonstrate against a controversial fingerprinting policy beginning at ports of entry across the country the same day.

About 80 protestors turned toward the ministry building and shouted in unison their opposition to the new policy, which requires all but a handful of foreigners to have their fingerprints and face photos taken to gain entry into Japan.

Representatives of human rights groups, labor unions, foreigners’ groups and individuals spoke out against the system — similar to the US-VISIT policy operating in the United States since 2004, but also targeting residents and not just tourists — calling it, among other things, “racist,” “xenophobic,” “retrogressive” and “an invasion of human rights and privacy.”

“It’s an expression of Japanese xenophobia. Japan is using this system as a tool to control foreigners. For the past few years, the government has been associating foreigners with things like crime and terrorism,” said Sonoko Kawakami, campaign coordinator for Amnesty International Japan, which organized Tuesday’s demonstration.

Lim Young-Ki, a representative of the Korean Youth Association in Japan, pointed out how ethnic Koreans had fought for decades until the 2000 abolition of fingerprinting on Alien Registration Certificates only to see the process revived through the back door now.

“This system is ostensibly an anti-terrorism measure, but it is extremely harmful to individuals and only applying the system to foreigners shows a lack of consideration for foreigners’ human rights. Even though the system of fingerprinting foreigners was completely abolished in April 2000, it’s infuriating that the Japanese government has reinstated this practice and this entry inspection system,” Lim said, reading a statement issued by his organization. “We want to use this demonstration to call on the Japanese government to promptly redress this system obligating foreigners to provide their fingerprints and face photos whenever they enter the country.”

Catherine Campbell of the National Union of General Workers [Tokyo Nambu], whose ranks contain many foreigners, echoed a similar line.

“This is a big step backward and I really think it’s sad,” she said.

Another foreign woman who identified herself only as Jennifer said she is a permanent resident, having lived in Japan for 38 years and with a Japanese husband and Japanese national children. She spoke about having previously provided authorities with her fingerprint and face photo while taking out and updating her Alien Registration Certificate.

“They already have my photo and my fingerprint…many times over,” she said. “This step is quite unnecessary.”

But an official from the Justice Ministry’s Immigration Bureau dismissed the protestors’ claims.

“This system was introduced to protect the lives and safety of citizens by preventing terrorism. There were rational reasons and necessities in introducing the system, which was approved by the Diet,” Yasuhiro Togo of the Immigration Bureau said, adding that the methods of fingerprinting differ from the abolished Alien Registration Certificate system. “The aim of taking fingerprints is different — we’re fighting against terrorism — and we will not be forcing people to put their fingers into ink as used to be the case. The fingerprints will all be taken and stored electronically.”

Changes to the immigration law in May last year allowed for the collection of biometric data. Now, except for special permanent residents — who are largely people born and bred in Japan — diplomats, children under 16 and others the government deems can be excluded, any non-Japanese entering the country must provide the fingerprints from the index fingers on both hands and a photo of their face before they can be permitted to enter the country.

The government says the new system is aimed at combating terrorism, but has also said it will provide data to crime-fighting authorities upon request. The Immigration Bureau’s Togo said such information would be handled in accordance with the Private Information Protection Law. He added that information collected by immigration authorities would not be handed over to foreign governments.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/news/20071120p2a00m0na020000c.html

Watching them watching us

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‘Fingerprint Day’ adds insult to injury for Japan’s foreign community

From July 3 to 11, 2005, U.N. special rapporteur Doudou Diene visited Japan to assess the factors of discrimination that affect a variety of minority groups in this country. In his final report, he recommended that the Japanese government should “avoid the adoption of any measure that would discriminate against foreigners, as well as in the exercise of all their rights and freedoms, in particular their right not to be persecuted and perceived as potentially more dangerous than the Japanese.”

Unfortunately, the government, today [the day that the government begins fingerprinting virtually all foreigners], officially commences measures that are greatly contrary to those recommended by the U.N. special rapporteur. As the Japan National Tourist Organization approaches the midpoint of its five-year Yokoso Japan Campaign, visitors and most non-Japanese residents will now be “welcomed” to Japan by an unconscionable demand for their fingerprints and photos, followed by near constant surveillance of their activities, and possibly even the occasional detention for up to 23 days. Yokoso Nippon! Welcome to Japan!

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20071120zg.html

Starting today, ‘gaijin’ formally known as prints

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Today sees the introduction of a law requiring the majority of foreigners entering Japan to be fingerprinted and photographed. This change has been met with howls of protest from foreign residents and the foreign media, who have pointed to the fact that the only terrorist attacks on Japanese soil have been carried out by Japanese.

Matters were not helped by recent comments from Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama, who attempted to justify the law by saying a “friend of a friend” of his was an al-Qaida operative who had entered Japan a number of times, using a different fake passport on each occasion.

In an effort to get an inside perspective on the new law, I wrote to a high-ranking Ministry of Injustice official closely involved in the planning and implementation of the measure. My source, who wishes to remain anonymous, sent the following statement by e-mail:

“Firstly, let me explain exactly what Mr. Hatoyama meant by his comments at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club. What he was trying to emphasize was the relative ease with which foreigners bent on causing harm can enter Japan. Rather than giving dry statistics or resorting to vague and empty scare tactics, Mr. Hatoyama thought it would be better to give a concrete example of why this law is necessary. He also hoped to show that, despite his position as justice minister and scion of one of Japan’s most famous political families, he is comfortable moving in any social circle. In hindsight, his choice of words was perhaps inappropriate, but the truth in what he said is undeniable. The simple fact is that this law will make Japan a safer country by tightening its borders and preventing would-be terrorists from entering.

“The main beneficiaries of this law will not be the Japanese or even foreigners living here, but foreigners who haven’t even been here, and the international community as a whole.

“Take the bankruptcy of Nova Corp. Thousands of foreign teachers have been left jobless and facing eviction in a country where many of them cannot speak the language. Had this new law been enacted years ago this unfortunate situation could have been avoided.

“Consider why these people came to Japan ? to teach foreign languages, mainly English, to Japanese people. Why do Japanese people want to learn? Partly to help foreign visitors who come to Japan for pleasure or business. The unique history and culture of Japan attract millions of visitors to these islands each year. However, the new law will significantly reduce this number so the need for foreign language teachers will decline sharply, and it is highly unlikely there will be a repeat of the Nova fiasco.

“In addition to protecting people from taking risky teaching jobs in Japan, this law will also help reduce the effect of brain drain on a number of countries. Huge numbers of Asians currently take advantage of Japan’s generous immigration laws to come here and work. Although they often send money home, the fact that they have had to move overseas has a serious effect on the quality of the workforce in their home country. Again, the new law will reduce the number of foreigners in Japan, and the benefits of this will be felt throughout Asia as countries’ brightest brains choose to stay and work in the land of their birth.

“The new immigration controls will also impact on globalization and its benefits for developing countries. The new law will probably cause some companies to close their offices in Japan and relocate to countries with less stringent border controls: developing nations in Asia, for example. As it has done in the past, the generosity of the Japanese government will allow other countries to develop economically and socially. Japan is a rich nation, but not a greedy one, and is glad to spread the benefits of globalization and free markets as widely as possible. This new law will indirectly allow us to do so.

“Of course, there will be benefits for the Japanese: Fewer foreign workers will mean more jobs for Japanese and this may go some way toward combating the growing income gap in Japan. Also, the pressure to learn English will be reduced, and this will allow Japanese people to spend more time studying their own country’s history, traditions and culture. English will become an optional language for those who really want to study it, and there will still be enough foreigners here to meet the reduced demand. But, as I outlined above, the main benefits will be felt internationally, as Japan steps back slightly on the world stage and graciously allows some other countries the chance to shine.”

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20071120a1.html

Nova boss lived in cloud-cuckoo-land

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“The superintendent at my apartment says to me, ‘Your rent is three months overdue; I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave,”‘ says Adele, who came from France six months ago to teach at Nova. “So I did a frantic Net search and found a place charging ¥40,000 a month. One six-mat room in a wooden building, with a filthy carpet on the floor and a shared toilet down the hall. The landlord told me it’s OK for four people to live in the room. So for now I’m living in it with three other teachers.”

This is too much for Weekly Playboy (Nov. 26).

“Why, you’d have more privacy in an Internet cafe!” the magazine exclaims. “This really is the very brink of homelessness!”

With about 4,000 foreign teachers in something like Adele’s position following the October collapse of the once-thriving language school chain, the opening to public view of Nova Corp. ex-president Nozomu Sahashi’s executive penthouse suite ? “furnished like a love hotel,” observes Sunday Mainichi (Nov. 18), complete with Jacuzzi bath, sauna, capacious bedroom, well-stocked bar and so on ? was salt rubbed into wounds already raw.

“We haven’t been paid in two months,” fumes an outraged Japanese staffer. “What are we supposed to make of this?”

One lawyer involved in the case ventures an answer.

“Think of it,” he tells Sunday Mainichi, “as an example of Mr. Sahashi’s exploitation of the company for his private pleasure.”

Like many an emperor, actual and would-be, Sahashi seems to have been grossly out of touch with street-level reality.

Beginning in 1981 he built up the Nova chain from nothing to a nationwide network of 924 schools, the largest of its kind in Japan and Japan’s largest employer of foreigners ? 7,000, including 5,000 teachers. So far, so good, but not even this year’s false advertising scandal, or the government-imposed sanctions that followed took the wind out of Sahashi’s bloated sails. As late as September, hiring was proceeding as though nothing had happened.

“I started teaching at Nova in September,” Weekly Playboy hears from a Canadian woman. “I haven’t been paid once. The company wasn’t even able to pay salaries, and yet they went ahead hiring foreigners who had no idea there were problems.”

She’s written home for money. Meanwhile, “I’m living on noodles, tofu and rice.”

“Rice, rice, rice!” chimes in Australian Peter Thompson, a Nova teacher for two and a half years. “I eat nothing but rice. It’s been awhile since I’ve tasted meat.”

“To the Japanese it might seem strange,” reflects Weekly Playboy, “that [Westerners] would come all the way to Japan in the first place with so little cash on hand.”

That gets a laugh from Mark, an American who’s worked for Nova for eight months.

“Listen,” he says. “Elites with vast amounts of money on hand don’t come to Japan to teach English! For my part, I quit my job in the States figuring on traveling around the world doing part-time jobs. Nova’s pretty well-known among people with that in mind.”

The takeover of Nova by a company promising to rehire as many teachers as possible has eased a mass plight which, when Weekly Playboy was reporting on it, was downright desperate: “No money, no Japanese government support, no possibility [owing to visa restrictions] of securing part-time employment in other fields, in some cases no roof over their heads, in a foreign country where they don’t speak the language . . .”

If all this is troubling Sahashi, he has shown no sign.

Sunday Mainichi delves a little into his background. He was born in Osaka Prefecture in 1951. Both his parents were teachers. After high school he studied in Paris for several years, returning at age 25 determined to do something about the Japanese people’s “language complex.” Nova Corp., founded in 1981, was the result.

“He was a real idea man,” an admirer tells Sunday Mainichi. Sadly for Nova students and staff, too many of his ideas seem to have been conceived in altogether too vast an office.

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fd20071118t1.html

Ex-President Sahashi claims he is victim of NOVA crash

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Ousted NOVA Corp. President Nozomu Sahashi told the Sunday Mainichi in an exclusive interview — the first he has given since the collapse of the English conversation chain — that “before I apologize to everybody, I want to get NOVA back on its feet.”

Sahashi, 56, vanished from public view as NOVA struggled throughout the summer and early autumn months, but despite being accused of mixing his private and public lives too much, he takes a strong stance on his handling of the company.

“I’m being set up as the bad guy,” he says. “I didn’t take a single day off from April as I went around busting my guts to try and get NOVA to rebuild under its own steam. I stopped taking a wage myself from July. If what’s going on now hadn’t happened, I thought I would have been able to get 10 billion yen to get the company back on track. (After I was sacked), there was this sudden liberation from the difficulties of trying to collect money and my mind is still a blur. I still haven’t thought about what I’m going to do from now.”

While Sahashi occasionally smiles during interviews with Sunday Mainichi reporters, most of the time his face remained stern.

Sahashi spoke during sessions conducted at a Tokyo hotel on Nov. 14 and 15. We asked Sahashi if we could take photos, but he steadfastly refused, saying, “I don’t know what face I should put on before the camera.”

Sahashi stood at the helm as the dominant president of NOVA before he was axed on Oct. 26, the same day the company filed for court protection from creditors. He vanished from public view ever since. He did not show himself to the roughly 300,000 NOVA students and employees and publicly was criticized for an “irresponsible” attitude. Receivers have strongly blasted his management and are considering pressing charges of breach of trust against him.

On Nov. 5, Sahashi filed a report with the Osaka District Court in which he denied many of the allegations about him that have been floating in the media in recent weeks. But the 200 minutes he spent with Mainichi reporters represented the first time he had confronted the media since NOVA’s collapse.

Sahashi was particularly vehement in denying claims that he had turned NOVA’s President’s Office into an opulent “secret hideaway.”

The hideaway was a Japanese-style room about the size of 8 tatami mats (around 24 square meters), contained a Jacuzzi and double bed. Receivers said they opened the room to the media because they wanted to show the world how much Sahashi was using the company as his private property.

“The double bed wasn’t for private use, but used as a guest room for visiting VIPs. It was mainly for guests from overseas. Some people are saying it was suspicious because the bed had two pillows, but hotel beds nowadays all have two pillows. This wasn’t the President’s Office. Within the company, we used to call it the ‘Business Center,’ ” Sahashi says.

Sahashi also denies claims that he had several lovers and that he had been involved with many of the women he employed.

“We don’t have secretaries in our company. Considering 80 percent of employees are women, there would be uproar if I ever became involved with a member of staff. As for the reports that I appointed former hostesses as secretaries, all I can say is that I don’t go to the kind of places where hostesses work. There couldn’t be a type further from the clubs of Ginza or Shinchi than me,” Sahashi said.

Sahashi becomes furious when discussion shifts to the G.education group that has bought out NOVA.

“I can’t get it out of my mind that what happened was a planned raid,” he said, each word hissed out with seething anger as he goes on to give his side of NOVA’s collapse.

NOVA’s fall was sparked by a February inspection of the company by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) following a spate of troubles rising out of the conversation school chain’s contracts with students. NOVA had escalated rapidly, setting up too many schools to be able to provide enough teachers and making it difficult for students to get classes they had been promised. NOVA’s situation worsened in June when METI said there had been 18 cases where the company had acted illegally and banned it from carrying out some of what had been its standard business practices. The ban led to a rush of students leaving the school and made NOVA’s fund-raising a more difficult proposition than ever.

In April last year, Sahashi was ordered to appear before the Osaka Consumer Center to explain how his company planned to avoid further contract problems with students. At the time, Sahashi turned up to a meeting with Osaka Mayor Junichi Seki accompanied by Liberal Democratic Party House of Representatives member Yasuhide Nakayama, which has led to media claims that the ex-NOVA boss was trying to use political strong-arming to influence his fate.

“We never applied any pressure on the mayor. How much influence do you think a two-time Diet member can peddle? Nakayama is my friend and I haven’t made any political donations to him. All we did was pay a courtesy visit to the mayor,” Sahashi says.

Sahashi explains what he did as NOVA was crumbling around him. He says he foresaw NOVA’s revival coming through merging his schools to cut costs and securing funds of 10 billion yen.

“With the merging of schools, I had been negotiating with a conference room rental company about taking them over with no further refurbishment and we were at the stage where we were talking concrete details. I forecast that shutting down schools would have brought in about 3 billion yen or 4 billion yen from returned deposits. My plan was to rationalize 200 to 300 schools from late October to November,” Sahashi says. “As for fund acquisition, I had set up a share warrant where 200 million shares would be issued to two fund companies and the plan was to have 3 billion yen at first in cash by Oct. 26. While searching for capital, I looked at 20 to 30 funds before finally settling on two investment companies based in the British Virgin Islands. I had a plan to increase capital by about 7 billion yen.”

Sahashi is also reported to have been involved with major share market speculator Haruo Nishida, who has been charged by the Osaka District Public Prosecutors Office for trying to manipulate the market. A brokerage industry insider explains.

“Sahashi was in a hurry to get money and saw many assets eaten up by anti-social forces. There are 8 million shares Sahashi had in NOVA that remain unaccounted for and this probably explains why his name has come up (with Nishida). There’s no doubt there was some murky ground in his plans to raise money. The link between Sahashi and Nishida, however, is a mystery,” the insider says.

Sahashi completely denies any relationship with Nishida.

“I don’t know him at all. I checked with the funds and they said he was a complete stranger,” Sahashi says.

Incidentally, Sahashi owned 48 million NOVA shares, or about 72 percent of the entire company. He says he gave an investment consultant 22 million shares from late July to mid-August to use them to try and raise money. He says the allegedly missing 8 million shares arose from this.

“I have no idea who owns them now. They weren’t returned to me by the end of September as promised and the investment consultant said they would be back by the end of October. The shares have been sold for sure, so my only option is to press charges. I realize it’s a bit late now to have them give back worthless shares, but unless I do that there’s no way I can prove my innocence,” Sahashi says.

Sahashi is also furious at the nature of his dismissal, which he calls a “coup d’etat.”

Sahashi says he first heard he had been dismissed as NOVA president at 5:30 a.m. on Oct. 26. He was woken by a phone call from a friend and given the news that he had been fired and NOVA was applying for protection from its creditors.

“I was shocked,” Sahashi says.

Sahashi says that divisions in the NOVA board first surfaced on Oct. 23, three days before he was fired. Sahashi gives his account of a conversation that occurred between himself and another NOVA director on that day.

DIRECTOR: Why don’t we apply for protection?

SAHASHI: We can’t. Why? Because I’ve got something (to raise money) and we can rebuild on our own.

DIRECTOR: Our employees don’t have the power to rebuild the company.

SAHASHI: Maybe we don’t have enough staff, but we can protect our students and employees. Our only option is to rebuild by ourselves.

DIRECTOR: I feel sorry for our employees in the firing line. That’s why we should apply for protection and then rebuild.

SAHASHI: The moment we do that, our students are going to vanish. What are we going to do about the students?

DIRECTOR: Apply for protection and we’ll find a sponsor.

SAHASHI: How will you find them?

DIRECTOR: There’s a bank that says it will help us.

SAHASHI: Which bank? Who have you been talking to?

DIRECTOR: I can’t say.

Soon after this alleged conversation, Sahashi says he received word from somebody who had been closely watching the NOVA executives.

“They warned me that the directors were being shifty. They told me that there was something strange about their behavior,” Sahashi says.

Sahashi says that before NOVA’s collapse, he twice had meetings with G.education, the group that ultimately came in to rescue the failed chain. Sahashi says he met G.education 38-year-old Chairman Masaki Inayoshi for the first time over the summer as NOVA sought a partner to tie up with to raise capital.

“I met Mr. Inayoshi twice, before and after the (mid-August) o-bon holiday. Inayoshi told me that he wanted to exchange shares and that he wanted to be the main shareholder. At that time, he presented me with a proposal where my shares would be split up into about five or six funds,” Sahashi says.

Inayoshi denies Sahashi’s claims.

“In about the middle of August, there was an approach to our shareholder Venture Capital about whether we would like to have a meeting with the NOVA president and that’s how I met Mr. Sahashi on two occasions. We never talked about a capital injection or exchanges of shares. I absolutely did not insist on becoming the main shareholder. I heard that NOVA was in a pretty poor state and told him that it would be extremely difficult for us to cooperate with him,” Inayoshi says.

Nonetheless, Sahashi still seems to feel that he has been set up for a takeover by G.education.

“There are signs that three directors had determined in advance that Oct. 26 would be D-Day, where the president would be fired and NOVA would apply for court protection. Even after I had submitted plans to merge schools and come up with money, the directors just ignored those plans and bought time until D-Day came around,” Sahashi says. “It takes time to apply for court protection from creditors. There’s a mountain of paperwork involved. It’s impossible to just suddenly make an application. NOVA’s lawyers made the application and I was unaware of what was going on. That’s a breach of trust.”

Sahashi maintains his stance that “there was a conspiracy to carry out a coup d’etat.”

“We were having trouble raising cash and were late in paying rents and employees’ wages. I guess the three directors thought the situation was no good. And I think maybe G.education got in on the act then, too. I don’t know which side initiated the conversations, but I have information that the directors were talking to G.education in advance of what happened,” Sahashi says.

Inayoshi once again denies Sahashi’s claims.

“That’s impossible, because we only met the receivers a short while before we were publicly announced as the company’s saviors. We were asked to show our plan to employees. That was three days before we were named to take over NOVA. It’s really sad he thinks he was caught in a coup d’etat and that we were involved in it,” Inayoshi says.

Despite Sahashi’s claims that he is the victim of a conspiracy, he can’t deny that he is suspected of hiding money.

One instance where he is accused of secreting cash away involves Ginganet, a communications company and subsidiary wholly owned by Sahashi and his relatives that owns the patent rights to the TV monitor system the conversation chain used to provide some lessons. Receivers say Ginganet sold the monitors to NOVA at heftily inflated prices to create profits that didn’t really exist. Receivers consider the Ginganet dealings as possible cases of aggravated breach of trust or embezzlement.

Sahashi denies the claims.

“Ginganet developed the systems, but they were assembled overseas by an assembly specialist. The factory is in Thailand. Assembly made up 60 percent of the wholesale cost of the machines and when you add in the commission for the assembler, it went over 80 percent. Put in the development costs and it means that Ginganet was actually selling the monitors at a loss,” Sahashi says.

He continues: “If I had any secret funds, I would have funneled them back into NOVA and rebuilt the company immediately. I used my personal assets, NOVA shares and my shares in other companies as collateral to raise money. Rather than having any secret funds hidden away, I’m a victim in this. I haven’t put a single yen in my pockets,” Sahashi says.

NOVA, however, is not so sure.

“There are absolutely no grounds to back up what Mr. Sahashi says (about Ginganet),” a NOVA spokesman says. “We are considering pressing charges.”

Joji Yabuki, head of the NOVA Seito no Kai, an association of students of the failed conversation chain, insists Sahashi show some sincerity.

“He should hold a news conference and apologize to all of us. If he’s not prepared to put in some of his own money to a fund aimed at helping students made victims by the school’s collapse, it’s hard to see him as being very sincere. There are 300,000 of us who are furious,” Yabuki says.

Sahashi is aware of the anger rising up against him across Japan.

“I have a large responsibility to bear and I sometimes feel like hanging my head in shame. Of course, bearing the ultimate responsibility, I feel absolutely terrible about what has happened to students and staff,” Sahashi says, but he is less forthcoming when asked if he plans to front the media to apologize publicly. “Do you think I’ll be able to finish everything just by fronting a news conference and saying ‘Sorry?’ ‘Responsibility’ for me means the responsibility to rebuild NOVA. How do the directors who proposed the takeover plan to take responsibility? They deserve to die 10,000 deaths!”

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/news/20071119p2a00m0na036000c.html

Hungry Nova teachers teach for food

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A labor union representing former teachers at failed Nova Corp. launched a program Saturday that enables students to pay for language lessons by buying them meals instead of paying tuition fees.

Nova has closed its schools nationwide, depriving nearly 300,000 students of classes and keeping the teachers out of work and pinched for money.

At a Tokyo park Saturday afternoon, teacher Kristen Moon, 23, gave a lesson lasting about an hour based on topics in an English-language magazine to 32-year-old Yasuhiro Kawatani. They then went to a nearby restaurant afterward.

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nb20071118a3.html

Worried NOVA students crowd into Osaka hall for meeting

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The NOVA Students’ Association held its first meeting here on Friday, with many students appearing worried as they listened to the explanations about the company.

About 1,000 participants poured into a hall in Osaka with a capacity of about 250, prompting the sponsor of the meeting to quickly find another location.

The group was formed earlier this month by about 70 students from areas such as Osaka and Tokyo. On Friday, the group’s representative, Joji Yabuki, explained the negotiating conditions between NOVA’s preservation administrators and Nagoya-based company G.education, which has stepped in to take over NOVA’s business.

Some students who participated in the gathering called for pursuit of former NOVA President Nozomu Sahashi’s responsibility over NOVA’s downfall. Others asked that they be able to continue their lessons at G.education without having to pay any extra.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/news/20071117p2a00m0na005000c.html

G.education officially takes over NOVA

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Preparatory school operator G.education has officially taken over NOVA, the failed operator of Japan’s largest English conversation school chain, company officials said.

The takeover took effect after a representative for G.education and receivers for NOVA signed an agreement on the handover on Tuesday.

Osaka-based NOVA filed for court protection from creditors under the Corporate Rehabilitation Law on Oct. 26. Receivers for NOVA decided on Nov. 6 to hand over its school chain to Nagoya-based G.education.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/news/20071115p2a00m0na003000c.html

New NOVA school opens

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A company that has taken over NOVA Corp., the failed English school chain, has opened a new school here, company officials said.

G.education, based in Nagoya, remodeled its “EC” English school as a NOVA school and opened it near Nagoya Station in Nakamura-ku.

The company will hold meetings for NOVA students and new students on Thursday and Saturday in addition to one it held on Wednesday. The new school can accept about 200 students and it will continue to teach EC students.

The new school is set to start lessons next week, according to officials.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/news/20071114p2a00m0na028000c.html

‘Gaijin card’ checks spread as police deputize the nation

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In the good old days, very few Japanese knew about Alien Registration Cards ? you know, those wallet-size documents all non-Japanese residents must carry 24/7 or face arrest and incarceration.

Back then, a “gaijin card” was only something you had to show a bored cop doing random racial profiling on the street.

Legally, in fact, it still is. According to the Foreign Registry Law (Article 13), only officials granted police powers by the Justice Ministry can demand to see one.

But in its quest to make Japan “the world’s safest country again” (without similarly targeting Japanese crime) and to stem hordes of “illegal foreigners” (even though figures for overstayers have been falling since 1993), the government has recently deputized the entire nation. From now on, foreigners must endure frequent “gaijin-carding” at work. Not to mention passport checks and copying of personal ID documents.

This open season on gaijin, as well as on terrorists and carriers of contagious diseases (which somehow also means the gaijin), has gone beyond fomenting the image that non-Japanese are merely untrustworthy. It has created policy creep. Gaijin-hunters in their zeal are stretching or breaking established laws.

Backtrack: After years of alleging heinous foreign crime and terror (Zeit Gist, Feb. 20, 2007), the government first deputized the public in 2005 (ZG, March 8, 2005). Laws regarding hotels were revised to require passport numbers and photocopies from all “foreign tourists” (i.e. people without addresses in Japan).

However, police immediately stretched the law, telling hotels to demand passports from all foreigners. Some hotels threaten refusals if the gaijin doesn’t cough up his card (www.debito.org/olafongaijincarding.html).

Now ? as of Oct. 1 ? the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare has chipped in, deputizing workplaces. Under the Employment Policy Law (“Koyo Taisaku Ho” ? see the MHLW Web site ), all employers (“jigyo nushi”) hiring, firing, or currently employing non-Japanese (except Special Permanent Residents and diplomats) must check their visa status, verifying that they are neither overstaying nor working outside their visa parameters.

This means filing a report at Hello Work, the MHLW’s unemployment agency. Information on all foreign staff, including name, date of birth, gender, nationality, visa status and expiration date, confirmation that all work is permitted under the visa, and employer’s name and address, must be provided ? on pain of penalties up to ¥300,000.

Proponents of the law, claiming it will “support the rehiring and better administration of foreign workers,” might well deter employers exploiting overstayers under the table. But in practice, the policy stretch has already begun.

For example, Regular Permanent Resident immigrants ? who have no visa restrictions placed on their employment and cannot possibly “overstay” ? must also be reported.

Another issue is that the law merely requires employers “check” the visa status of their foreign staff. There is no requirement for foreigners to physically hand over any personal documents. Yet several people have contacted me to say employers have demanded both their gaijin card (which for ID purposes works the same as a passport) and their passport for photocopying.

Furthermore, these “checks” are already not limited to your main employer or visa sponsor. I have received reports that any gaijin payment requires photocopied visa verification. In one case for a sum as low as ¥500! Yet my legal counsel confirmed with the MHLW that checking isn’t required for part-time work.

Conclusion: If hunting foreigners means tracking every yen they earn, this new and improved “gaijin card checkpoint” system goes far beyond the cop on the corner. It even voids the gaijin card. What’s the point of its existence if “verification” necessitates passports too?

The justifications for this new system are these: You’ve got to make sure foreigners aren’t working outside of their official Status of Residence. As we have reported (ZG June 28, 2005), even taking a quick part-time job can be a visa violation in certain cases.

Photocopies are apparently necessary because employers need proof on file if they get nobbled by the cops. (As if the police won’t ask the foreign staff for their original documents if a raid actually happens.)

Moreover, sometimes gaijin cards and passports differ in detail, like when the visa status changes in the passport, but the bearer neglects to report it to the Ward Office.

But if all these loopholes needed closing, they should have been encoded in the law. They weren’t, so demanding anything beyond a visual display of your gaijin card is policy overreach.

Now the floodgates are open: Unrelated places, such as banks, cell phone companies, sports clubs and video stores now illegally require gaijin cards for any service, even when other forms of ID ? such as driver’s license or health insurance booklet ? would suffice for Japanese.

What’s next, fingerprinting?

Japan needs more lawyers, or at least more lawyerly types. Anyone who reads the actual laws will in fact find natural checks and balances. For example, even if the cops issue their classic demand for your gaijin card on the street, under the Foreign Registry Law (Article 13), you are not required to display it unless the officer shows you his ID first. Ask for it. And write it down.

And believe it or not, under the Police Execution of Duties Law (Article 2), cops aren’t allowed to ask anyone for ID without probable cause for suspicion of a crime. Just being a foreigner doesn’t count. Point that out.

As for gaijin-carding at hotels, all you have to do is say you have an address in Japan and you are in the clear. Neither foreign residents nor Japanese have to show any ID. The hotels cannot refuse you service, as legally they cannot deny anyone lodging under the Hotel Management Law (Article 5), without threat to public morals, possibility of contagion, or full rooms.

And as for gaijin-carding by employers, under the new law (Article 28) you are under no obligation to say anything more than what your visa status is, and that it is valid. Say you’ll present visual proof in the form of the gaijin card, since nothing more is required.

If your main employer forces you to have your IDs photocopied, point out that the Personal Information Protection Law (“Kojin Joho Hokan Ho”) governs any situation when private information is demanded. Under Article 16, you must be told the purpose of gathering this information, and under Article 26 you may make requests to correct or delete data that are no longer necessary. That means that once your visa status has been reported to Hello Work, your company no longer needs it, and you should request your info be returned for your disposal.

Those are the laws, and they exist for a reason: to protect everyone ? including non-Japanese ? from stretches of the law and abuses of power by state or society.

Even if the Foreign Registry Law has long made foreigners legally targetable in the eyes of the police, the rest of Japanese society still has to treat foreigners ? be they laborer, customer, neighbor or complete stranger ? with appropriate respect and dignity.

Sure, policymakers are treating non-Japanese residents as criminals, terrorists, and filth columnists of disease and disorder ? through fingerprinting on arrival, gaijin-house ID checkpoints, anonymous “snitch sites” (ZG, March 30, 2004), DNA databases (ZG, Jan. 13, 2004), IC chips in gaijin cards (ZG, Nov. 22, 2005) and now dragnets through hotels and paychecks.

But there are still vestiges of civil liberties guaranteed by law here. Know about them, and have them enforced. Or else non-Japanese will never be acknowledged or respected as real residents of Japan, almost always governed by the same laws as everyone else.

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