Dialogue Broken Off

It was just a disguise after all. At the end of intensive dialogue with Okinawa for a month, the national government rejected to give way for opposition against building new military base in Henoko, Nago City. In the meeting on Monday, Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yoshihide Suga, announced the Governor of Okinawa, Takeshi Onaga, that national government would resume construction of the base in Henoko. Onaga responded to it with firm determination to disturb it. It is fair to say that national government did not have any positive intention to make compromise, as predicted from the beginning.

Considering broad criticism against unilateral construction, national government temporarily stopped the work and embarked on dialogue with the local government of Okinawa last month. Suga, in charge of this issue, accumulated direct talks with Onaga both in Tokyo and Okinawa. The meeting on Monday was assumed to be the last talk in the month for intensive dialogue. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for the first time attended the talk.

Abe soberly reiterated official standpoint of national government. “Origin of the issue for relocating Futnema Marine Air Base to Henoko was bilateral agreement between Japan and United States nineteen years ago. It is necessary to remove danger in Futenma as soon as possible,” told Abe in a way of bureaucrat who would not listen to any voices from citizen. To the question from Onaga about resumption of construction, Suga said “I had to do.” “I will stop it with every measure,” replied Onaga. Both sides did not know how to make the things up.

One-month intensive dialogue may make matters worse. Ministry of Defense will resume the construction after diving survey of Okinawa Local Government will be finished next Saturday. Onaga is likely to void the allowance of development in Henoko, based on the survey, which is supposed to conclude that the construction is destroying wild life. National government may ignore Onaga’s decision or raise a lawsuit against Onaga accusing he was disturbing public exercise legally correct.

If national government had been willing to make a breakthrough, it must have been discussing some alternative way of relocation to Henoko. But, it simply insisted on its reasoning that Henoko was only viable solution. This is firmly based on an ideology that national government is superior to local government, which bureaucrats in Kasumigaseki potentially embrace. Abe administration has been reinforcing its political basis by coinciding this authoritarian concept. Coercive application of unilateral policy in Okinawa will make Tokyo government further isolated in Japan.