Role Play of Government and NPO/NGO on refugee issues in Japan

※This blog post is a role play of two perspectives regarding to the issues of refugees from the Japanese government and the NPO’s working in the country. This blog does not vocalize any individual perspective of a one or a group.

Perspective of people from the government

As a member of the Japanese government, we think that risk management is one of the most important thing about the issues regarding to refugees. We understand that there are a lot of people suffering but on the other hand, there are a lot of people who is trying to take advantage of our policies. In Japan, we have a system called skill training policy. This was a policy where we invite workers from developing countries to share knowledge for the good of both countries. The problem is that we are somehow missing around 30000 foreigners after we teached them our resources. This number is not the number of people who left Japan. This is the number of people which we have no idea where they are. This is the part where we call the situation “high risk”. We can not trust a group of people where they may just take advantage of Japan and secretly eat up the resources.

Another obvious reason that we don not invite refugees is the wall of language. Japan has a high literacy rate in Japanese but most of the local people can not speak, write or read English. If the local people can’t speak English, there is no chance that they can communicate. This is not only because Japanese people can’t speak English. It is because refugees can not speak fluent English as well. If the refugee was capable of speaking English, we do have some options to communicate. But usually refugees are not skilled enough to speak “good English”. This makes a lot of obstacles in the translation method used in Japan, leading to a lack of communication.

First of all, we are the third largest donator in the world. We are using a large portion of taxes on supporting refugees, why do we have to be criticised for not inviting them? Places such as European countries were suffering from accepting a lot of refugees. We do not want to take the risk of destroying our local culture through the issues that they bring in. That is why we donate a lot of money so they can live in their own country or another country that they evacuated to. As the government, we would keep on supporting refugees through donation, but not by inviting them.

Perspectives of NPO, NGO

In Japan, being recognized as a refugee is a serious issue. Most of the people that came to Japan was not informed by the strict policies and they are still seeking for the refugee status.
It is easy to say that they can go to another country but that is not a option for a lot of refugees. They did not have the knowledge that Japan is highly strict on accepting refugees. They just knew that this country was safe, and was easy to get a traveling visa. This trapped them on to this isolated land since they do not have a country to go back.

The government only recognizes the people who have actually applied, but since you have to write a ton of documents in Japanese, most of the people are not even in the stage of “applying”. In Japan, it is told that there were 7000 applicants and 11 being accepted. This number gives 2 impressions to the reader.

There was only 7000 applicants in Japan.
Only 11 people were accepted.

Both of them are serious issues but you can easily get miss directed from this information. In Japan, it takes around 3 years to be recognized as refugee (including the fact that most people gets denied). Therefore, the application that the 11 people made were mostly from previous years.

The 7000 applicants are only people that actually completed the document, the number of people seeking to be a refugee is much higher. As you can see, the impression you obtain from the two facts is really different if you know about this issue.

We understand that the government does not have any space to change their regulation. We are just seeking for support. In terms of access, we have to locate our self in a urban area with high rents and open our office throughout the week. If we can have some more subisity or donations, we would be able to help the refugees that are suffering. We are not asking for a change in the world. We just need a portion of the power so we can at least confidently protect the people that are seeking for support.

From The Perspective of Refugees/Migronaut

     We want to be accepted. We will go any country, if the rights and freedoms are admitted. We don't ask too much. We know 'Beggars can't be choosers'. That being said, we want the right to an adequate standard of living. (It's guaranteed in the human rights related documents) 

     In reality, there're some greedy refugees. It can't be helped. They say that Japan is tough to live because most of Japanese can't speak English properly, much less understand what we say!! and Japanese government should concede the part of the medical treatment because we are refugees and don't have much money enough to recuperate completely.

     I think the latter is true. Surely, Japanese should study English and make some laws related to the issues of refugees laxer before addressing stupid stuffs, but the rules (laws) related to the medical treatment for refugees should be revised as soon as possible. I want to be alive much longer. I don't want to forsake my family. From these reasons, please, please Japanese government. Please make the rules and laws related to medical treatment laxer for us.

From The Perspective of Citizens in Japan

     We, Japanese, really want to help the refugees (migronaut), but when we see this problems from three other aspects, we can understand we can't make a decisions easily.

     

     First, on the aspect of economical reasons. In other word, on the aspect of business. It is sad that there are many Japanese who can't speak English, much less read or write down it properly. (I'm one of them tho lol) Because of this reason, I think we can't make good relationships with them easily, let alone instruct them to do. It is serious problem, I guess. We should reconsider and revise the curriculum of English. I mean we should make the way we teach the students English renewed first.

     Second, we don't know how to help them anyways. Yes, we really don't know. We are just saying "That's too bad" or something like that. We just feel sorry for them, despite the fact that we don't know anything. There're some people who make an actions to this problems,  even though we don't know not only the way we help them, but also the whole story. And it is difficult to understand the details or the way we help them because these kind of articles are often written in 'rigidly formal writing style' so we feel it's a pain in the neck. 

     Lastly, it is good thing that the Japanese government gives primary consideration to Japanese. It is natural that the nation Japan cherish there own citizens. Not strange. Quite natural. I guess there some people who say that, like, 'Nowadays, the world is trying to move forward to reunite. So we should think the other countries as much as our own.' Yet, this opinion is too optimistic, too stupid. Actually, I also think that it's super free for the people around the world and if we're going to reunite, it may bring us the peace, but it's impossible for the time being at least. 

     Therefore, I think we can't accept the refugees, although we want to help them.

30 Controversial Questions on Refugees in Japan

These are questions that we want to invest our time and effort to develop our understanding on this topic. The questions would be used to enhance the quality of our final presentation.
It is a memo-like blog post and not designed to be read.

1. What is the definition of refugees in Japan by the government?
2. What is the definition of refugees in Japan by local people?
3. What is the definition of refugees in Japan by NPO's or NGO's?
4. How many refugees are there in total in Japan?
5. How many people are seeking to be a refugee in Japan?
6. Who are the people or what kind of people are against accepting refugees?
7. Who are the people or what kind of people are with accepting refugees?
8. What is the difference between the attitude against refugees in other countries and japan?
9. When did refugees become a issue in Japan?
10. What is the merit of supporting refugees?
11. What is the demerit of supporting refugees?
12. What kind of controversy can be observed?
13. Where can people find support?
14. How does this issue relate to other issues?
15. Why is Japan so strict about accepting Refugees?
16. Why are some countries so flexible about accepting Refugees?
17. Where do the refuees mainly come from?
18. What kind of incidents causes refugees to be born?
19. How does the agriculture affect the number of people being accepted.
20. Considering our country's economy, can or should we accept refugees or even migrants?
21. What are some ethical problems that we can think of regarding to refugees?
22. What are some moral problems that we can think of regarding to refugees?
23.  If the Japanese people accepts refugees, how or would the government cover the cost associated with them?
24.  Since Japan doesn't have enough land, how would the refugees live in Japan?
25.  How do we get over the problems of the languages?
26. Is it a smart choice to come to Japan if they have so many problems?
27. What is the reason behind the difference between the amount of donation and acceptance rate?
28. Do you want to work with refugees?
29. How high or low is the awareness of refugee problem in Japan.
30. How high or low is the awareness of refugee problem in other countries.

Introduction to this blog

Our blog, "Issues on Refugees in Japan" is a blog focused on the controversial issues around the topic of refugees limited in Japan. This blog would be updated every week by 2 writers, George and Rion who are students in Japan.

We have created this blog post as a school project on journalism and controversial issues.

Refugees in Japan is not a known issue since Japan is strict on accepting refugees and the awareness are really low. We have chosen this blog since the writers has some background knowledge on this issue and we want to raise some awareness on it.