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Ginoza village assembly chair: We want to see birds fly in, not U.S. military planes

The Japanese and U.S. governments persist in constructing a new U.S. air base on the shoreline of the U.S. Marine Corps' Camp Schwab in Nago City, Okinawa Prefecture, as part of the U.S. military realignment plan in Japan. Ginoza Village will be located under the airspace for U.S. military aircraft if the air base is constructed.

As the villagers were preparing a meeting to oppose the "shoreline plan," the first such rally in Okinawa, Shiroma Seishun, chair of the rally's organizing committee and Ginoza Village Assembly chair, in an interview with Akahata stated as follows:

The shoreline plan by the Japanese and U.S. governments will force our village to exist under U.S. military air space. In view of the likely adverse effects such as noise pollution, crashes, and other accidents, the plan is absolutely unacceptable. In November 2005, shortly after Japan and the United States reached agreement, the village assembly adopted a unanimous resolution opposing the shoreline plan.

Given the fact that sonic booms at the U.S. Futenma Air Station are felt not only in Ginowan City but in neighboring Urasoe City and Nakagusuku Village, a minor change in the location of the runway cannot eliminate the widespread noise damage.

The peaceful coastal village has hills behind it, and there's nothing that causes noise pollution in the area. Sonic booms will be unbearable to villagers.

The Japanese and U.S. governments are contemplating concentrating U.S. military bases in the northern half of Okinawa's main island. This is outrageous.

Training exercises by U.S. Marine Corps amphibious tanks have already destroyed the coral reefs. Tanks even intruded into villagers' housing lots.

It takes a hundred years for the destroyed coral reefs to revive. The damage has already dealt a serious blow to the fishing industry, the village's key industry.

In the sea, there are areas cultivating 'mozuku' edible seaweed. Last year, a U.S. amphibious tank broke down on the coral reefs, scaring mozuku harvesters into abandoning the place.

We are afraid that we would face not only devastation of the sea but an assault from the sky. Our peaceful life will be destroyed.

The Japanese government, however, neglects to explain anything to our village, insisting that Ginoza is not local. There is no dividing line between the sea off Henoko and that of Ginoza. The government explains nothing to the fishermen's union.

U.S. Camp Hansen and Camp Schwab occupy 51 percent of the land area of Ginoza Village. Unyielding to the burden of the U.S. bases, Ginoza villagers are trying to develop the village as a "hometown with sunshine, greenery, and water." The villagers want to co-exist with the rich natural environment and want to see various birds fly in, not U.S. military planes.

We don't want the sky over the village to be occupied by the U.S. military. We want the Japanese government to act in the interests of the Japanese people, not of the U.S. military. Although Ginoza is a village where political conservatives maintain their strong vote base, urged by the sense of crisis that the shoreline plan would have calamitous consequences, the village is now firmly united in opposition to the shoreline plan regardless of political orientation.

I want the coming villagers' rally to let the government know how the residents are strongly determined to block the shoreline plan.
- Akahata, April 1, 2006