Japan Press Weekly

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2007 April 25 - May 8 [CIVIL RIGHTS]

Constitutional revision procedure bill is in a mess: JCP Shii

Pointing out that the bill to establish procedures for constitutional revision has proved defective, Japanese Communist Party Chair Shii Kazuo at a press conference in the Diet building on April 26 demanded that the bill be scrapped.

Shii pointed out that JCP representatives in both Houses have revealed the bill submitters’ inability to answer two key questions about the bill.

Firstly, the submitters cannot explain the reason why they refuse to specify the minimum voter turnout rate in the bill.

“Why do they want to establish a system in which only 10 percent of the public could revise the nation’s supreme law? This is the point which the public is criticizing most severely,” Shii said.

Secondly, the bill will deprive five million teachers and public servants of their freedom of expression by imposing a ban on any “political activities” as an “abuse of status,” but the bill submitters have failed to specify what kind of activities could fall into the categories of “political activities” and “abuse of status.”

Shii said, “Imposing restrictions on expressing opinions on the Constitution itself is unjustifiable. What’s worse, this bill is seriously defective because no one knows what will exactly be restricted.”

“Now that it has become unequivocally clear that this bill has serious fundamental defects, it must be scrapped. A forcible passage of the bill is absolutely unacceptable,” Shii said. - Akahata, April 27, 2007