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Nuclear evacuees to face tougher housing situations from April

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Disgraceful, eight years on.

16 ( +17 / -1 )

Suppose Japan starts taking in refugees----where would THEY be housed?

-6 ( +3 / -9 )

These people needed to be compensated by TEPCO and/or the central government for their houses so that they could buy or build again.

22 ( +23 / -1 )

Last Stop on the gravy train. 8 years is way enough time to figure out what you're going to do.

-10 ( +8 / -18 )

The words "Voluntary evacuees" is used several times in this story. How is running away from a triple nuclear meltdown and fear of radiation contamination considered "voluntary". On another point, it's been 8 years now. Why haven't these unfortunate victims (not voluntaries) rebuilt their lives yet. Even though the government states "has significantly lowered air radiation dose" I could never live near a nuclear power plant again. I would have already counted my losses, relocated and rebuilt my life elsewhere. I already did it once in my life. Counted my loses and rebuilt my life from scratch. It's tough at first but if you keep positive and put your mind to it life gets better.

19 ( +20 / -1 )

I understand it though, Free Housing free utilities who would want to leave?

-8 ( +4 / -12 )

Japan giving up on it's own people, yet they give billions to other countries

10 ( +15 / -5 )

They want them to return to their homes, but they are ghost towns with little or no infrastructure or amenities. Absolutely disgraceful! TEPCO should be supporting these people indefinitely.

23 ( +25 / -2 )

What is the ‘ground radiation dose’?

And what is a ‘safe’ dose of radiation for a baby? A child? An adult?

So many unanswered questions!

12 ( +12 / -0 )

Awful to see domestic refugees treated this way. TEPCO need to step up.

12 ( +14 / -2 )

Yes, just look at the photos. What luxury. Who wouldn't want to live there, even if they had the wherewithall to have their own home?

11 ( +12 / -1 )

The disaster continues sadly. The govt fails its own once again, typical!

There seem to be very little incentive other than go home & live in or near radiation...….WTF!

There are MILLIONS of empty homes nationwide(another MASSIVE problem) that could have easily figured into a GOOD option for those willing to start anew elsewhere!

13 ( +14 / -1 )

Yes, just look at the photos. What luxury. Who wouldn't want to live there, even if they had the wherewithall to have their own home?

The utter lack of even basic human empathy from some posters on here never ceases to appal. Let's hope they never have to be old, poor, sick and forced from their homes by earthquakes and nuclear disasters.

11 ( +15 / -4 )

So.....

The Japanese government is spending BILLIONS on the 2020 Tokyo Olympics!

And the Tokyo Olympics is supposed to be the "Reconstruction Olympics"!!

But....

The aid for these people is being terminated!!!

What a disgrace!!!

But completely predictable!!!

13 ( +14 / -1 )

The utter lack of even basic human empathy from some posters on here never ceases to appal.

Bingo. Nuclear refugees are the equivalent of the welfare queens of their fevered imaginations.

At least for home/landowners, pre-disaster market value of their properties should be determined paid by TEPCO and their government partners. Then let them use the money to buy elsewhere. I understand wanting to move renters out of a bleak hellscape like this, but as long as they have ongoing support to rent elsewhere (i.e. other than places the government says are "safe").

7 ( +8 / -1 )

Alfie, The utter lack of even basic human empathy from some posters on here never ceases to appal. Let's hope they never have to be old, poor, sick and forced from their homes by earthquakes and nuclear disasters.

Who's to say they're not and have taken matters into their own hands and rebuilt their life?

-7 ( +1 / -8 )

Yes, just look at the photos. What luxury. Who wouldn't want to live there, even if they had the wherewithall to have their own home?

The utter lack of even basic human empathy from some posters on here never ceases to appal. Let's hope they never have to be old, poor, sick and forced from their homes by earthquakes and nuclear disasters.

I read that as sarcasm, Alfie.

9 ( +9 / -0 )

@ alphie and maria - does it feel good to be the champions of the downtrodden and oppressed? These people are living there because they want to, they don't want to leave cuz now they have to pay for their housing instead of using their money for Pachinko and such

-11 ( +1 / -12 )

What now? Waiting for the government to find you new and better housing that is also free?

-9 ( +2 / -11 )

If they didn't want to be there they would have found a way out years ago

-7 ( +3 / -10 )

If they didn't want to be there they would have found a way out years ago

Refugees and people in devestating, life-changing circumstances can face a cycle of poverty and misery, that's only exacerbated by their surroundings.

they don't want to leave cuz now they have to pay for their housing instead of using their money for Pachinko and such

Such class snobbery and hatred of the poor is the mark of a bollix.

6 ( +8 / -2 )

Japan's justice system certainly have problems. I do not hear any executive of TEPCO was imprisoned at Kosuge for investigations.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

sensei258, I disagree, these people lost everything, everything through no fault of their own. Just starting again with carrying that burden of complete loss is a mental hurdle most people don't have to deal with. Then to add to their misery a government that concentrate them in a ghetto sucking any positive actions out of reach. Everyone of these victims should be handsomely paid out. Either from the Olympics budget or from tax payers ideally from TEPCO, although that's again tax payers money. Empathy.

10 ( +10 / -0 )

@ alphie and maria - does it feel good to be the champions of the downtrodden and oppressed? These people are living there because they want to, they don't want to leave cuz now they have to pay for their housing instead of using their money for Pachinko and such

Are there some who might game the system, sure. But perhaps you could suspend judgment and imagine what some of these folks went through for just a moment. Much of their community destroyed, friends and family killed, utterly traumatized. Displaced, alienated and fearful to this day, and rightfully suspicious about anything the government tells them.

And as with the disaster proper, which disproportionately killed the elderly, how do you know that a sizeable portion of these evacuees are not older? Their homes are likely contaminated ghost towns, no value left to their properties. Perhaps for many, starting life anew elsewhere is a pretty terrifying prospect. Not to mention the treatment many evacuees faced when they did relocate, kids bullied for being contagious. You're a grandpa--how quickly would you want to relocate and start anew in some distant place, finding new work--b/c it's so bountiful and rewarding for people your age. How happy to see your kids or grandkids in new schools, where they're likely to be targets.

Or those suffering mental trauma, still not in a right mind. For someone who finds a good deal of empathy for victims of crimes on these threads, you sure display an enormous lack of it about victims of one of the worst disasters in world history.

8 ( +8 / -0 )

This is so sad. Victims in boxes. I went there a couple of times just after the disaster. Of those still standing, the vast majority were quite big two story houses with gardens and parking.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

I read that as sarcasm, Alfie.

Yes, I wasn't referring to Maria, I was just adding my comment to hers.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

Why don't the minister move there and stay in the zone,come back home every day for the ease of concern from local since government said is safe to return .Show good example .If minister don't want to live there .What do you expect the citizen to believe you. The problems in the first place created by government .Destroy people hometown to unlivable.due to radiation .I believe the problems still there.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

@ toasted - class snobbery and hatred of the poor? what are you talkin about? I am one of those poor. I bust my ass and work paycheck to paycheck. nobody's handing me money or giving me free housing

-8 ( +0 / -8 )

The prefab temporary housing in the photo is in Natori, near Sendai. That's a decent distance from Fukushima Daiichi and an area widely devastated by the tsunami. The people in these prefabs may actually be tsunami victims, not nuclear refugees who are the focus of this story. I think that will be fairly likely.

The story is actually about other prefectures giving public housing for free to people from towns like Iwaki that were near the plant. It is charitable of them to have done this, and it may be fair to assume that such evacuees are now back on their feet. Public housing is below market rents and does not have ripoff agent fees or key money, so anyone living in it is still getting assistance, even if they are paying.

Public housing in Kobe was offered at reduced rents for earthquake victims for twenty years. This ended up being a cause of resentment from other occupants.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

@ toasted - class snobbery and hatred of the poor? what are you talkin about? I am one of those poor. I bust my ass and work paycheck to paycheck. nobody's handing me money or giving me free housing

Perhaps you might have a wee bit more sympathy, in that case. These families lost everything.

6 ( +6 / -0 )

His tone makes it sounds like he thinks these people caused their own problems to try to get freebies.

Indoctrination. Capitalism (and in the US, especially) instills a need for people to see being working class or poor as somehow worthless. One is exhorted repeatedly to better oneself, be a success, get rich and by voting for the "right" party, leave your origins behind and sneer at those who don't.

It's TEPCO who need sneering at, not the people who lost everything and were made domestic refugees.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

@philly1

Let's hope they never have to be old, poor, sick and forced from their homes by earthquakes and nuclear disasters.

I read that as sarcasm, Alfie.

If you read the "they" to mean the commenters rather than the victims, the sarcasm goes away.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

sensei258Today  09:59 am JST

@ toasted - class snobbery and hatred of the poor? what are you talkin about? I am one of those poor. I bust my ass and work paycheck to paycheck. nobody's handing me money or giving me free housing

I don't know of there situation so I wouldn't be so quick judging them. I guess some of them are still paying their 30 years loan they could afford by "busting their ass and work paycheck to paycheck" on their now worthless habitation ... Sounds like a tough situation to be.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

It's like flood/bushfire evacuees never wanting to leave the danger zone and keep living on welfare fund and free housing provided by the government. Rebuilding their lives is way too costly where the employment opportunities are scarce. Maybe TEPCO should hire them instead.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

Japan simply can’t afford the free handouts to these freeloaders...

There are multi billion yen rowing facilities and archery centres to construct for the upcoming olympics. I have also witnessed with my own eyes vast sways of the countryside totally devoid of any concrete. Thats where out tax money should go!

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Tepco should have built new homes for these evacuees from the start, it has probably cost more to build these temp homes and payment in subsidies. if your in your mid 50,s how do you go out and buy a new house? what with? most of your collateral is the old house that is in a radioactive area. all of there possessions, memories, photos, cars etc are still there, and not the subsidies are stopping??!! what a kick in the teeth for these people, how low can you go? Tepco should build x amount of new homes at their cost to rehome these people.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

I did some voluntary work from 2014 to 2016 for an organisation called OGA for Aid. They were set up to help the tsunami victims. They did a lot of good actually. And from what I saw, the people were just forgotten about. It's pretty bad really. In other news, they've just started surfing again in the no go area of Fukushima.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/08/back-in-the-water-fukushima-no-go-zone-gets-first-surf-shop-since-disaster

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Free housing? How many of those who have criticised the people living there, even implied they are parasites, would live in such housing even if it were free?

I wouldn't chose to live in a place like that even if it were free, even if I were paid to. I feel sorry for those who do.

When I think about it, I might chose to live in such housing in preference to a much nicer house in an area that I thought would give me cancer even if TEPCO and the government assured me it wouldn't. After all, those organisations still insist nuclear power was and is safe.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Unless all energy goes green, citizens will have a choice of black lung & asthma (coal and gas power) or possible cancer (nuclear). Unfortunately, the atmosphere and oceans don't respect national boundaries, so region and hopefully world needs to go green too.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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