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Japan's Labour Market

The LatAm Connection

Suvendrini Kakuchi writes from Tokyo
***Latin Americans of Japanese descent are benefiting from a law that emphasises blood links to the detriment of Asians seeking jobs in Japan's labour market. Latin American workers, having legal status, have an edge over their Bangladeshi or Philippine counterparts.
AN old immigration law that upholds the protection of blood ties among Japanese has allowed thousands of Japanese Latin Americans to seek economic opportunities In the land of their ancestors.
But social workers and human rights advocates have criticised the law—which permits second-or third-generation Japanese Latin Americans who can prove descent from Japan to apply for permanent residence—as discriminatory against Asians seeking Jobs in Japan by denying them legal access to the labour market
They point out that the host of social problems confronting the eager applicants tends to disprove the official view that because the migrants are Japanese, there would not be any difficulties.
Critics of. the immigration policy say It is the worst example of the Japanese island mentality that emphasises Japanese blood links and shows no tolerance at all towards outsiders.
"The law says Asians cannot work in Japan because they are foreigners. On the other hand. Japanese Latin Americans who have been born and bred In another country are given Japanese rights because they have ancestors who were bom here, an argument that I consider unjust." said Rev Hiroshi
Watanabe of the Kaiaba No Kal. a group that helps Illegal workers.
The severe labour crunch tn Japan's expanding economy has resulted In the Influx of workers from. Third World countries.
Despite numbers that reach well over the official 120,000 illegal workers—mostly from Asia—living in Japan, the government has refused to change laws barring unskilled labour.
Last June, the immigration office tightened controls on unskilled workers with no proper visas by Introducing severe penalties for both workers and employers. This forced many Aslans to opt for deportation or go underground.
As a result many Japanese factories are now hiring Latin Americans of Japanese descent.
"When I go back to Brazil, many poor people ask me to help them get Jobs in Japan and I am ashamed to say only Japanese can go," said one Japanese Brazilian.
According to the Ministry of Labour, there are 80,000 Japanese Latin Americans registered here but unofficial estimates say there are over 300,000 living in Japan.
Most of them are from Brazil, which has the largest population of Japanese ml, grants who went of South America for better economic opportunities during the 1920's and 1930's. Others come from Peru. Venezuela and Argentina.
Latin American workers, having legal status, have an edge over their Bangladeshi or Philippine counterparts.
There are very few cases of Japanese Latin Americans being dragged into gang rings or women being forced to work as prostitutes like Asians, according to Mario Lima Brasil, who heads Catla. an active Latin American workers support committee.
But, like Asian Illegal workers. the Japanese Latin Americans form a permanent underclass in Japanese society doing factory or farm Jobs shunned by wealthy Japanese.
"I probably will settle here because there are no economic opportunities back home." said 32-year-old Paulo Tanaka who works for 12 hours a day in an auto parts plant and lives with his Brazilian wife and two children in a two-room apartment.
"But I am not accepted here as a Japanese and will never be." he added.
Local television reports have featured the lives of the new migrants, many of whom are in their twenties and thirties
They regularly send back to South America portions of their salaries for the support of extended families or for building luxury houses they hope to return to someday.
Volunteer social workers working with Japanese South Americans say the biggest problems facing the settlers stem from adjustment difficulties.
"They may look like Japanese but they cannot speak the language and they think and act like foreigners which means they are social outcasts." said Brasil.
Disillusionment has resulted in stress problems and even suicides, he said. Painful ulcers are a common ailment among migrants, he added.
"You find people who had been surgeons working In factories or painters laying bricks and as a result they are under severe emotional stress." said Brasil.
Volunteers criticise the government for not providing1 counselling systems or services that guarantee the right to better life.
"For instance, the brokers who bring In the workers and take large fees that Include a 40 percent contribution from the migrants" salaries should be controlled." said a volunteer. - ips.