Asahi Says "Expel the (Local) Barbarians"

[Mulboyne]

Asahi: Drive out yakuza groups
What exactly are yakuza organized crime groups? For one thing, they cannot coexist peacefully with everyday citizens. In Fukuoka Prefecture recently, yakuza gang members have been shooting off guns in one incident after another. It has gotten so bad that Takaharu Ando, the commissioner general of the National Police Agency, went to the prefecture to instruct police there to take strong measures to wipe out organized crime groups. Last month in Kita-Kyushu, someone fired a shot into the home of a neighborhood association leader whose citizen group was campaigning to banish Kudokai, which is a designated yakuza organization in the region. The mayor, who was determined to drive out yakuza from the city, received a threatening letter...These incidents bring the total to eight of shooting incidents related to this construction company, which has refused to make payoffs to Kudokai. Incidents that targeted citizens, such as the neighborhood association leader and company executives, are plainly challenges directed against society. They must not be tolerated.

This month, an ordinance was enacted in Fukuoka Prefecture that aims to eliminate yakuza groups. It is the first in Japan that includes punishment for corporations that make payoffs to yakuza groups. The National Police Agency is urging other prefectures to enact similar ordinances based on Fukuoka's model in its efforts "to shift from a situation in which it is 'police versus yakuza' to one where it is 'all of society versus yakuza.'" We urge police nationwide to act together to do all in their power to protect citizens and quickly arrest yakuza suspected of crimes, eventually forcing such gangs to disband. Otherwise, society will never be able to stand against organized crime...The only way to eradicate yakuza is to cut off the gang's source of income and weaken its organization...There must be no cracks in the wall set up to hem in yakuza groups...more...