Drilling Blue Coast

Seventy years after Henoko was named as a candidate for relocation of Futenma Marine Air Base, the government of Japan at last drove the first shot of drilling on the seabed of the coastal area in Henoko district of Nago city, Okinawa on Monday. Protesters were excluded from the construction area by police and coast guard. The government was not wrong in terms of law enforcement, because the governor of Okinawa allowed it. However, it is not legitimate as long as the governor’s choice was against general will of Okinawa.

A bureaucrat of Ministry of Defense once paralleled law enforcement in Okinawa with rape. “When a man rapes a woman, do you think he will say ‘I’m raping you’ to her?” told the Chief of Okinawa Defense Bureau in 2011, when he was asked why the bureau did not tell the day of submitting a document of environmental assessment around Henoko. For the protestors in Okinawa, drilling started on Monday was nothing but raping the beautiful blue coast.

The ministry had failed in the same attempt in 2004. Protesters disturbed drilling approaching the site with boats and canoes, and it gave the trial up without any strike on seabed. With that lesson, the ministry enclosed the drilling site this time, and showed an attitude to arrest invaders mercilessly. Protesters’ boats were completely excluded and could not reach the site.

Argument against Ministry of Defense is intermitting the construction effort until the end of the gubernatorial election on November 16^th. Incumbent governor, who accepted the offer of landfill against his campaign promise four years ago, has already announced his intention to run for the third term. An opposite candidate is going to make his mind to run against the incumbent. Request of listening to the voice of Okinawan people in the election just makes sense.

However, Shinzo Abe administration has no intention of hearing those voices. With pessimistic view for the election, officers around Abe seems to realize that they need to make as great progress in the construction as possible before the election. Their short-term goal is finishing this boring research before the election.

It is a sort of gamble a democratic government would not make. If opposite candidate wins the election, it is likely that the relocation plan will face a deadlock by denial of any minor change in construction plan. There will be no basis for discussion between Tokyo and Okinawa, destructed by ignoring public opinion. The national government needs to go back to the basic of democracy.