国際人権ひろば No.124(2015年11月発行号)

Invisibility Brought About by "Reconstruction" and Voices of Resisting "Upstanders"

Two Types of “Reconstruction” – “from the top” and “from the bottom” in Fukushima

 

“Our town does not have the word ‘reconstruction.’ First we have to ‘restore’ utilities, and it is a start from minus. Our people in the town have increasingly decided not to return home. Therefore, I want to aim at ‘creative construction,’ not ‘reconstruction.’ I would like to make efforts together with all of you 

bearing the words ‘unflagging’ and ‘never-give-up,’ said Tamotsu Baba, the mayor of Namie Town, at the inauguration of “Project Namie” on March 22, 2015, four years after the Great East Japan Earthquake. Namie Town is located 10 kms from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. 

Since the earthquake, the government has hammered out the “Creative Reconstruction” program and promoted it for the past five years which was considered as an “intensive reconstruction period.” But, ironically, Mayor Baba declared that the “reconstruction” is not relevant to a town where many people will not return. 

For the past four years and eight months, what has been done in Fukushima under the slogan of “Reconstruction”? In 2013, a leading advertising agency was commissioned to organize the Third Tohoku Roku-Kon Festival in Fukushima City, which generated 3,700 million Yen economic benefit.  Fukushima Prefecture drove the “Destination Campaign” to attract tourists to Fukushima from April to June 2015. Both were extraordinary, gorgeous and promising. Meanwhile, Namie Town and other neighboring municipalities exposed to radioactive pollution still face the problem of residents from the evacuation place not willing to return even after the off-limit zoning was lifted. In some parts of towns, unsafe and difficult conditions prevent residents from coming home. No human being, no land and no community. 

The word “reconstruction” uttered by people in the community is far from the one uttered by the state and prefectural governments. Two types of “reconstruction” confront each other in Fukushima. It should also be pointed out that the top-down reconstruction is going on without clarifying who is the “main actor” in the process of reconstruction. Both types are not necessarily identical. 

“Reconsruction Disaster” – its Light and Shadow

 

According to Professor Ikeda of Kobe Shoin Women’s University, after disasters occur such as the Great Kanto Earthquake or the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, Japan would push the “development –and-growth-oriented reconstruction model” while causing “reconstruction disaster” such as the  suppression of speech, increase of warlord, bankruptcy and increased of unemployment.

Consequently, the slogan of “human restoration” in the post-war Japan or “correction of gaps between Okinawa and mainland Japan” or “autonomous economic development” were not achieved, only leaving sacrificed people behind. The reconstruction of the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake facilitated impoverishment among residents and financial crisis of affected local governments due to large scale projects led by general contractors.  

Flexible container bags for the decontamination
in Iitate Mura Village, Fukushima Prefecture

“Voices of “Upstanders” resisting against invisibility of the reality

 

Lauren Kempton, a researcher of the Holocaust resistance movement of New Heaven University in the US, promotes his idea that people in resistance are “upstanders who bravely stand up against any barrier that could deprive of their life or dignity.”  They do not choose to be “bystanders.” There are also people in Fukushima who quit being bystanders and became upstanders in the developments after the nuclear accident. 

In May 2015, after Fukushima Prefectural Government and national government decided to cease housing support for voluntary evacuees, people organized a rally in the Parliament Members’ House. During the rally, Ms. Saeko Uno who was in evacuation in Kyoto said, “It is not the state who decides about evacuation. It is us to do so.” If we really want to see even a faint hope in the post Fukushima, we have to listen to voices of people in the struggle for life and dignity. That is the way to make the invisible visible.  

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• « Reconstruction Process Has Made Radiation Victims Invisible
• The Right to Health of the Affected People in Fukushima Nucluear Disaster: From the Perspective of the UN Expert »
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