Mothers Challenge Japanese Nationality Law

[Greji]

Reversal: Nine kids with Japanese dads not citizens


This is pathetic! If a J-father admits paternity before the child becomes an adult, then the child should have a right to J-citizenship. Why isn't anyone working to change this law? Fucking racist, moralistic, mother-fucking government!

Actually, the ruling makes sense based on the existing laws. The system can be abused by any J-male claiming to be the father (for money or otherwise) to give the child citizenship, when the actual mother and father could both be foreign. Bad, but legal.

As you say, it would be better if the J-government, like a lot of countries, recognized birth within the confines of the country, as proof of citizenship. But this is going to taken a lot of power wielding to get this type of legislation through the Diet and as long as there are other countries that do not recognize a domestic birth as being the right to citizenship, the "Japan is Unique" crowd will never allow such a bill to be introduced, let alone a law to be enacted.

Have you ever be in a conversation with a Japanese about citizenship and the topic of naturalized Japanese comes up? Somewhere thereafter, regardless of how "un-prejudiced" they may seem, or consider themselves, when they refer to Naturized Japanese, they will automatically dismiss them by saying "I mean real" Japanese people (e.g. not naturalized ones that are really still gaijins, who can get a Japanese passport). I run into this a lot when the topic of people like Debito, or the naturalized gaijins who have been elected to public office, comes up.

[joshuaism]

But does it make sense that the Japanese constitution and it's guarantee of equality doesn't trump the law? Obviously a lower court agreed with me that this didn't make sense.

The system could be abused, like you said, but why would anyone try it? Wouldn't a claim to paternity hold a man financially responsible to that child? Would any guy be dumb enough to open himself up to being charged child support for a child that's not his?

I don't think Japan has to grant citizenship to anyone born within Japan, but if it can be proven that a child has a Japanese parent (of either sex), then that kid should have a right to Japanese citizenship. Citizenship shouldn't just be limited to Japanese fetuses.

[American Oyaji]

I'll tell you what Japan wants. To be come the country of Eastern West Virginia.

They also want slaves. They want foreigners to come and work, but so sorry, please to not fucking our women. Oh, you got knocked up by japanese boy, so sorry, please leave.

[Greji]

But does it make sense that the Japanese constitution and it's guarantee of equality doesn't trump the law? Obviously a lower court agreed with me that this didn't make sense.

The system could be abused, like you said, but why would anyone try it? Wouldn't a claim to paternity hold a man financially responsible to that child? Would any guy be dumb enough to open himself up to being charged child support for a child that's not his?

I don't think Japan has to grant citizenship to anyone born within Japan, but if it can be proven that a child has a Japanese parent (of either sex), then that kid should have a right to Japanese citizenship. Citizenship shouldn't just be limited to Japanese fetuses.

The abuse comes with children being claimed by yaks and others, to allow the mother to continue to live in Japan and work as hooker/hostess and to obtain certain rights from the Japanese system for having a "Japanese" child. The "father" doesn't have to be the biological father, just someone to claim this fact to keep the child and obviously, the mother in Japan. It is an old yak scam for hostesses, just as a lot of the hostesses try to get knocked up to as a way to stay in Japan.

As far as proof, in Japan, the "father" only has to place his han stamp on the appropriate document and/or register the child at the city office. No other proof is required.

If you want to check out strict countries, check the US policy for childeren born in Japan to US citizens a couple of months after the wedding. If your bride to be is pregnant and you wait to long to register the marriage, you may have to submit to DNA testing to register the child as a US citizen born abroad.

[joshuaism]

If you want to check out strict countries, check the US policy for childeren born in Japan to US citizens a couple of months after the wedding. If your bride to be is pregnant and you wait to long to register the marriage, you may have to submit to DNA testing to register the child as a US citizen born abroad.

I've been through that and it wasn't that big of a deal. It takes a little while to get married when you have to get permission from the military.

from the US Embassy Tokyo:

The father must sign a sworn statement agreeing to provide financial support for the child until s/he reaches the age of 18 years]or[/b] the child is legitimated under local law;
or paternity is established by a competent court before the child attains the age of 18 years;

They even have a form to acknowledge paternity and it states in the form that if the father does not agree to provide financial support for the child then the child is denied citizenship. DNA is not (always) required, and you have until the child's 18th Birthday to complete the process. Much easier to get it accomplished over 18 yrs. + 9 months as opposed to only having the length of the baby's gestation to admit parentage.

So why doesn't America worry about the mafia taking advantage of sex workers and the like?

[kamome]

Somewhere earlier in the thread there was a mention that J-judges have started to strictly construe the law as it's written to forbid J-citizenship to babies fathered by J-fathers who claim paternity after the birth. This means that at some point judges were more lenient? If so, the change in course indicates that politics are influencing the law more than it should. I wouldn't be surprised if somehow judges were told to change their interpretation in order to conform with the government's anti-immigration policy goals.

[Greji]

I've been through that and it wasn't that big of a deal. It takes a little while to get married when you have to get permission from the military.

I went through that many years ago in the military and everybody used to say it was a pain in the arse, but the truth of the matter is it was a great boon for the visa and green card.

The original pre-marital investigations by the military were for prevention of GIs marrying foreign nationals and later at a minimum, prevention of marrying "undesirable" foreign nationals. This was after WWII and in the days of limited or no fraterization policies. The reason that it was continued is that the paperwork for the premarital investigation and subsequent command approval/authorization, was everything that the wife needed for an immigrant visa and green card into the US.

After my wife and I got married, we went to the embassy with my pet goat and applied for the wife's visa and received it with little hassle. Her green card on application was also later received in good time. As you have probably noted on some of the treads herein, compared with the problems that people on the board have had getting an immigrant status visa, the military system, where a paperwork pain, is really the easiest way to go to get a spouse into the states. It is much more time consuming for civilians.

[joshuaism]

I went through that many years ago in the military and everybody used to say it was a pain in the arse, but the truth of the matter is it was a great boon for the visa and green card.

Eh? A big help for the visa and green card? Well probably not so much any more. When I went through the process 3 years ago it just felt like a scavenger hunt to get every meaningless signature on the list. We didn't have to get a police record or any serious medical check-up to get married, so those things still needed to be accomplished when it came time to get a visa. And the military didn't require any proof of a relationship like they wanted at the embassy either. Hell, they started doing all the prenatal care just on my say-so before anything else was accomplished. But then it could have just been that the military doesn't worry about japanese nationals so much.

And while it may discourage dumb marriages to foriegn nationals, if you got married in the states you didn't even have to mess with the shit. I remember my buddy married a psycho-American chick on a whim while on leave back home, in the course of a few months, things went to shit and a lot of money, love, and time was wasted for no good reason. Why couldn't the military step in and stop that bullshit?

[Greji]

Eh? A big help for the visa and green card? Well probably not so much any more. When I went through the process 3 years ago it just felt like a scavenger hunt to get every meaningless signature on the list. We didn't have to get a police record or any serious medical check-up to get married, so those things still needed to be accomplished when it came time to get a visa.

Well you don't have to get your ass in a sling! Mine was done by the USAF and as I said, it was along time ago in my case. At that time, you received a copy of the police check (if it was negative, obviously) and also had to clear through the hospital that made all the exams, plus x-rays that were also needed at the embassy.

If they have dumped all of that, then it is probably not only a waste of time, but probably close to an evasion of privacy unless a security clearance is involved.

[American Oyaji]

I don't know if it was my security clearance or what, but my ex had to have all that done when we got married. I still have the paperwork.
Police check done by USAF OSI.
Medical check by base doctors.
It took three months after we submitted the paperwork. She had to liste EVERYBODY she ever worked for or ever knew. But this was also 13 years ago too.

DAMN! Has it been that long?

[joshuaism]

Well you don't have to get your ass in a sling! Mine was done by the USAF and as I said, it was along time ago in my case. At that time, you received a copy of the police check (if it was negative, obviously) and also had to clear through the hospital that made all the exams, plus x-rays that were also needed at the embassy.

If they have dumped all of that, then it is probably not only a waste of time, but probably close to an evasion of privacy unless a security clearance is involved.

It could be that they did a rush job for me to have a dekichatta-kekkon. It certainly wouldn't make good Japan-US military relations if base procedures led to illegitamate births.

As for getting a security clearance, I never listed my wife's previous employment or personal relations (aside from family) like AO did, but then I was probably too lazy to ask my wife for them.

[American Oyaji]

It could be that they did a rush job for me to have a dekichatta-kekkon. It certainly wouldn't make good Japan-US military relations if base procedures led to illegitamate births.

As for getting a security clearance, I never listed my wife's previous employment or personal relations (aside from family) like AO did, but then I was probably too lazy to ask my wife for them.

Actually, I just gave her the paperwork, because it was in English and Japanese.

[Mulboyne]

Here's a similar situation from another angle:

Yomiuri: 2 Filipinos win family register cases

The Tokyo Family Court decided to allow two women fathered by Japanese men whose identity could not be verified, to have family registers in Japan so that they can acquire Japanese nationality, a Philippines Nikkei-jin Legal Support Center spokesman said Monday. At a press conference held in Manila, the spokesman said that because the family registers of the two women's fathers, who migrated to the Philippines before World War II and married Filipino women, could not be found in Japan, the court has to approve the issuance of new family registers, which will allow the two women, whose paternity could not be verified, to become Japanese nationals based on circumstantial evidence. The center is a Tokyo-based nonprofit organization that checks the identities of people of Japanese-Filipino descent. The court decision brings the number of Japanese-Filipinos granted permission to apply for family registers in Japan to four. In February last year, two Japanese-Filipino sisters were granted permission to apply for family registers after their Japanese father's identity had been confirmed. Monday's decision, however, marks the first time approval has been granted to those whose paternity could not be verified.

Of about 2,900 second-generation Japanese-Filipinos said to be living in the Philippines, there are about 300 whose paternity cannot be verified. Currently, 40 people have applied to the court for permission to apply for a family register in Japan. As such, the court's decision is likely to set a precedent for application approvals. The two women granted permission to have family registers are Juanita Sakamoto, 80, of Baliwag, Bulacan Province and Melecia Yoshikawa, 89, of Sagada, Mountain Province. In October, 2005, Sakamoto applied with the Tokyo Family Court for a family register as the second daughter of Takeichi Sakamoto, a native of Hiroshima Prefecture. At the same time, Yoshikawa filed a similar application with the same court as the eldest daughter of Masutaro Yoshikawa, who was from Nagasaki Prefecture. The court approved Sakamoto's application on Sept. 28 and Yoshikawa's on Wednesday.

According to the center spokesman, Takeichi migrated to the Philippines before the war and married a Filipino woman in 1923. During the war, Takeichi worked as an interpreter for the Imperial Japanese Army, but was sent to a prison camp after Japan was defeated. After the war, he went missing, the official said. Masutaro worked as a road builder on Luzon, an island in northern Philippines, before the war. He married a Filipino woman in 1914 and died of illness in 1932. He is said to have been buried in the Philippines. To have a family register in Japan, Japanese-Filipino persons have to prove their fathers were Japanese and their parents got married officially, if their fathers do not have family registers in Japan. Since Sakamoto's and Yoshikawa's fathers registered their marriages, the court determined that the two women can be considered having acquired Japanese nationality when they were born. As such, the court decided to allow them to have family registers in Japan.

[Mulboyne]

Japan may have just created a new class of legal Filipinos. The headline says 20,000 but the body of the text talks of 200,000 so make your own guess which is the intended number.

Japanese Court Ruling May Pave Citizenship For 20,000 Mixed Filipino Children

Monday's ruling by the Tokyo Family Court may pave the way for the grant of Japanese citizenship to thousands of Japanese-Filipino offspring. The court approved the citizenship petition of Juanita Sakamoto, 80, and Melecia Yoshikawa, 89, despite the lack of confirmation from their Japanese fathers' family registers. Although the two belong to the pre-war progeny of Japanese-Filipino unions, the court decision have implications on the citizenship question of around 200,000 similarly situated youth seeking a Japanese passport as well.

The two women initially had difficulty establishing their fathers' identities due to lost records resulting from the second World War. Sakamoto's father was last reported inside an internment camp. Yoshikawa's father, a construction engineer in northern Luzon, passed away in 1932. The Tokyo court used Sakamoto's detention record as evidence.

There are around 3,000 Filipinos born to Japanese fathers during the pre-war era. However, following the migration in the 1990s of Filipinas who worked as entertainers in Japan and eventually bore children with Japanese men, the number of Japinoys (Japanese-Filipino children) has ballooned to around 200,000. Several non-profit organizations, such as the Manila-based Center for Japanese-Filipino Children's Assistance, may see in Monday's decision by the Tokyo Family Court a glimmer of hope for thousands of Japinoys seeking not only paternal recognition, but also Japanese citizenship - seen as their ticket to a better future.

[Mulboyne]

Yomiuri: Family court decision sets precedent for other Japanese-Filipinos

...According to the center and other sources, in 1903 about 1,000 to 1,500 Japanese came to the Philippines to construct roads. This was the first large group of Japanese to arrive, but was followed by an increasing number of immigrants. Before the war, the city of Davao, on the southern island of Mindanao, attracted many Japanese as a production center for Manila hemp. Davao soon had a 20,000-strong Japanese community--then the largest in Southeast Asia. Many of the Japanese men married Filipino women. But the Philippines went on to become the scene of fierce fighting during the war, with the behavior of the Imperial Japanese Army leaving a legacy of anti-Japanese feeling. Animosity to Japanese-Filipino descendants flared among local people, prompting some to hide their Japanese origins by taking Filipino names. Others were denied access to education due to poverty.

During the 1980s, when anti-Japanese sentiment waned, many Japanese-Filipinos established associations for Nikkei-jin across the nation. The Japanese government, meanwhile, surveyed Japanese-Filipinos in cooperation with the federation of the Japanese-Filipino associations. The 2005 survey found that there were about 45,000 Japanese-Filipinos, including second, third- and fourth-generation descendants, living either in Japan or the Philippines. The recent court decision to allow the two to create new family registers holds out the prospect of an economic boost for many Japanese-Filipinos. It means that other Japanese-Filipinos likely will be able to get Japanese nationality, opening the way for their children and grandchildren to come to work in Japan on a resident visa. "After World War II, Japanese-Filipinos found themselves on the bottom rung of Philippine society. Now that they have been shown to be Japanese nationals, their suffering should be redressed economically and legally," said Hiroyuki Kawai, a lawyer and representative of the center...

[Mulboyne]

Yomiuri: U.S. records proved paternity - Japanese laws said to have hindered effort to obtain info domestically

U.S. prisoner-of-war records from World War II provided the vital evidence to proving the paternal origins of two Japanese-Filipino women who won a Tokyo Family Court decision in September to allow them to create new family registers, automatically giving them Japanese citizenship. Although the same records--which would be of great help to the other 300 Japanese-Filipinos applying to create new family registers as Japanese nationals--are kept in the archives of the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, the documents have been almost completely unavailable, drawing criticism from those involved as well as experts. Those applying to create a new family register, a process called shuseki, are Japanese-Filipinos fathered by Japanese men who went to the Philippines before World War II. U.S. military authorities created a basic personnel record for enemy aliens or prisoners of war when enemies were captured or sent to detention camps. The record included the prisoner's name, age, address and fingerprints. Juanita Sakamoto, 80, submitted the U.S. record bearing her father's name and photographs to the court and it proved to be vital evidence for the September court decision. Copies of the U.S. personnel records were handed over to the Japanese Cabinet Office in 1955 and transferred to the health ministry two years later. Currently, the records of about 160,000 detainees and POWs, including those who were in camps in the Philippines, are kept in storage in the basement of the ministry.

The Philippines Nikkei-jin Legal Support Center obtained a copy of the records in question in the United States. According to the Tokyo-based nonprofit organization that checks the identities of people of Japanese descent in the Philippines, about 300 among the estimated 2,900 second-generation Japanese-Filipinos have not verified their paternity. Meanwhile, 40 Japanese-Filipinos in their 60s to 80s are applying to create new family registers. Hiroyuki Kawai, lawyer and representative of the center asked the ministry to release the records several times from the end of 2003, to no avail. The center had no choice but to gather information in the United States.

The center's representatives combed the records at the National Archives and Records Administration in College Park, Md., to check the information provided by 356 Japanese-Filipinos against the records. Although the center was able to search only a portion of the records, it found the records of 17 people, including Sakamoto's father. Of them, the center submitted the records of five people to the Tokyo Family Court as evidence to verify the paternity of eight Japanese-Filipinos. The center also is preparing the legal process for three others.

Kawai asked the ministry in March to disclose all the records. If the records were made available to the public, it would make it much easier to verify the paternity of the Japanese-Filipinos seeking citizenship. However, according to the center, the ministry decided not to release the records, arguing the information is of a personal nature and cannot be released due to privacy rules. "Why do we have to refer to the records in the United States, when the same records exist in Japan?" Kawai said.

The Personal Information Protection Law stipulates personal information of an individual cannot be provided to a third party without the consent of the person, in principle. Yet the law has an exceptional provision that states such information may be provided to a third party when there is a need for the protection of a person's life or livelihood. Masao Horibe, professor emeritus of Hitotsubashi University, an expert in information law, said, "There's no specific negative effect [that could be caused by the release of the records]. If there are Japanese-Filipinos who could be aided by the release of the records, the information should be disclosed out of humanitarian considerations."

Horibe's remark is more relevant, considering the Japanese-Filipinos in question are elderly. The ministry's internal regulation set rules that the personnel records should be released only at the request of the person in question or a family member. An official of the Social Welfare Bureau of the ministry said, "The records are clearly personal information, therefore we'll release them only when the person or a relative demands the disclosure." Ikuhiko Hata, a lecturer at Nihon University and expert on modern Japanese history, said: "There is no point to keeping valuable records and documents locked away in storage. What's the point of keeping those records [confidential]? The government should release them."

[American Oyaji]

so basicaly, the ministry is being a bunch of xenophobic arseholes.

[Mulboyne]

AFP: Japanese Supreme Court rejects nationality law

Japan's Supreme Court ruled Wednesday against a law that denied citizenship to children born out of wedlock to Japanese fathers and foreign mothers, a court official said. Japan's top court ruled in favor of 10 Japanese-Filipino children suing for citizenship in Japan. The children were split into two separate cases, one filed in 2003 and one filed in 2005. The suits were filed by Filipino mothers who had proved the fathers of their children were Japanese, the report said. "The court rejected the previous rulings," a court spokesman said on condition of anonymity, citing department policy, referring to the Tokyo High Court's decisions in 2006 and 2007 that denied the children Japanese citizenship. He declined to give further details. But the Wednesday decisions backed up even earlier rulings by the Tokyo District Court that the marital status of the parents had no bearing on nationality, and that denying the children citizenship violated constitutional guarantees of equality for all. Nationality in Japan is determined by bloodline rather than place of birth, though foreigners may apply to become citizens. Many ethnic Koreans, for instance, have been born in Japan but retain the Korean nationality of their parents.

Under current law, a child born in wedlock to a foreign mother and Japanese father is automatically granted Japanese nationality. But a child born outside marriage can only obtain nationality if the father acknowledges paternity while the mother is still pregnant. If the father recognizes the child as his only after the child's birth, the child is unable to receive citizenship unless the parents get married, according to Kyodo News agency. Children born to Japanese mothers are automatically granted Japanese nationality, no matter what the nationality of the father is or whether the parents are married.

[amdg]

Nice decision. It's good to see the constitution being put to some use once in a while.

[Mulboyne]

The mothers were pretty happy when they came out of the court:

[gomichild]

Nice decision. It's good to see the constitution being put to some use once in a while.

What amdg said.

[Takechanpoo]

"Here we can continue to work in Japan and do remittances to Filipine and build a gorgeous house there!!!! Yeah!!!!!"

By the way, divorce rate of J-husband and pino wife is approx 80%.

[Mulboyne]

From the Asahi editorial:

... In handing down the well-reasoned ruling, the top court argued as follows: In the past, it was thought that a child's close tie with the country of its parent was based on the marital relationship between the parents. But both society's views and realities concerning families and parent-child relations have changed over the years. Many countries have scrapped such legal discrimination in granting nationality to children based on circumstances surrounding their births. The plaintiffs were all born and raised in Japan and are attending Japanese schools. While they are living as members of Japanese society, the lack of Japanese nationality puts them at a serious disadvantage in various aspects of social life. One of the plaintiffs, 10-year-old Masami, dreams of becoming a police officer, but it will remain beyond her reach unless she is given Japanese nationality. Such discrimination and a violation of individual rights should not be left unaddressed.

One in every 10 children who have Japanese fathers and foreign mothers is born out of wedlock. There can be various circumstances surrounding the births of these illegitimate children. But there must be many cases in which the Japanese father is responsible for the child's illegitimate status. In any case, there is no fault on the part of the child. There is nothing such children could have done to make sure that their fathers would acknowledge paternity before their births or their parents would get married after they were born. There are tens of thousands of children born to Japanese fathers and foreign mothers who are not recognized as Japanese nationals, according to an estimate. What was noteworthy about the Supreme Court decision was that it approved of interpreting the law in a way that makes it possible to rescue people subject to discrimination. In granting nationality to the plaintiffs, the court applied the law by ignoring the provision it deemed unconstitutional.

Some of the 15 justices on the grand bench, however, dissented, arguing that the provision that is unconstitutional should be corrected through legislation. However, the Diet and the government have failed to revise the law while the constitutionality of the provision has long been questioned. Waiting for new legislation to fix the problem would further delay relief for the victims. We support the Supreme Court decision. It exercised its power to determine the constitutionality of a law so as to actually make things better for the children.

[Behan]

Nice to see some progressive opinions from a Japanese newspaper.
A former high court judge told me that the Asahi was more left-leaning than other papers like the Yomiuri and so he cancelled his subscription to it.

[Mulboyne]

[joshuaism]

While [thread=20942]waiwai[/thread] might be on the way out, at least we'll still have Tokyo Confidential. Tokyo Confidential weighs in on the supreme court ruling on nationality with this report from Sapio.

The pregnant woman was a 27-year-old Chinese studying Japanese in Tokyo. Her visa had lapsed. With Ozawa registered as the child's father, the child would be Japanese; the mother would be granted a visa extension and, in due course, permanent residency. Ozawa received 300,000 yen for acknowledging paternity, with an additional 700,000 yen to be paid upon completion of the documentation after the child's birth.

"But I blew it," Ozawa muttered, "and got myself arrested."

He led police to the woman's residence. The woman reportedly owned up immediately. The Chinese trader, she said, took care of everything ― passport, visa, entrance formalities at the language school, and, finally, a Japanese "father" for her baby. The fee for that last service was apparently 3 million yen.

"With permanent residency, I could marry the child's real (Chinese) father and lead a happy family life in Japan," Yuan quotes the woman as saying. "For that, 3 million yen seemed a small price to pay."

This was the first case of its kind to surface in Japan, Yuan writes. It is by no means unique, he adds. He links the trader to the notorious human-trafficking group known as Snakehead. Illegal residents in Japan are believed to number some 400,000, up from 270,000 in 2000. The Supreme Court ruling, whatever its human rights implications, is, collaterally, a boon to "bogus Japanese" and their brokers, in Sapio's view.

[Mulboyne]

[Greji]

I saw this headline in the English Yomiuri:

16 'Japinos' to make nationality bid

The bid by the sixteen is based on an October decision by the Tokyo Family Court on pre-WWII families and not directly the recent Supeme Court decision, although the article links the two cases. I was struck, however, to see the coinage "Japino" for the first time. I thought it might be a creation of the translator but here it is in the text of the original Japanese version:



It's interesting to see customs, languages and laws adjusting to new norms. The Yomiuri usage has "Japino" referring to a child with a Filipina mother and Japanese father. It's the first such coinage I've seen in the national media and, if it sticks at all, it is either going to come to mean all such offspring, even if the parent's nationalities are reversed, or it is going to disappear to be subsumed by the word hafu.

The first is more likely. If Japan is going to become a "nation of immigrants" or at least see a sharp increase in mixed-race children it's odds-on that you will begin to see such coinages turn up to distinguish between, say, an American-Japanese and a Chinese-Japanese. Hafu or haafu might have been fine when all you wanted to express was "not quite/really/wholly Japanese" but if you want to explain a bit more about such people, new words are probably going to be needed.

The Hawaiians have already donated "Happa Haole".

[Buraku]

This is pathetic! If a J-father admits paternity before the child becomes an adult, then the child should have a right to J-citizenship. Why isn't anyone working to change this law?

Do not disturb the social "wa"

[Mulboyne]

This is pathetic! If a J-father admits paternity before the child becomes an adult, then the child should have a right to J-citizenship. Why isn't anyone working to change this law?

Do not disturb the social "wa"

People did work to change this law and the Supreme Court ruled in their favour as the previous posts explain.