Call for a New Campaign to Build Refugees’ Commune

by SAN’YA WORKERS WELFARE CENTER,  SAN’YA DISPUTE LEAGUE & COMMITTEE for STRUGGLES AGAINST UNEMPLOYMENT

Original Text HERE

1.
There is no need for much phrasing about the devastating damages and tragedies caused by the earthquake of 3/11, as well as the coming catastrophic situation. At this moment, we, the coalition of self-support groups of homeless and underclass workers in Sanya, the vicinity closest to the stricken areas in the north within Tokyo metropolitan district, consider the situation as un-ignorable and will begin a new campaign to support refugees. Herein are three tasks for the struggle:

A)To create a support system by and for the people
B)To support the refugees from the stricken areas, and fight together for their/our rights and autonomy
C)To support the future refugees to be created inevitably by the effects of this calamity, and fight together for their/our rights and autonomy

2.
About (A):
The Japanese government is dispatching massive number of the Self Defense Forces to the stricken areas. As opposed to the state-led project, our most urgent task is to create a support system, no matter how small it is, by and for the people. To begin with, we shall send persons and goods to the areas once a week. We call this People’s Rescue Troops.

About (B):
The refugees from the stricken areas have already begun their lives in the facilities installed in various places in the Tokyo metropolitan area, from which, however, the intervention of civilian support groups are rejected, and wherein what the administration supplies is said to be far less than people’s needs. It is thus our task to understand and supply what they lack. Furthermore it is necessary to begin a project for establishing the lives of the people by and for themselves from the mid-term perspective.

About (C):
Riemann Shock of 2008 caused the new wave of refugees, epitomized as it was by the so-called dispatched villages. The homeless population in Sanya area increased dramatically. But the situation now is just incomparable. Already rampant have been discharges and suspension of employment. Our fellow homeless have been mercilessly hit by the effects of the earthquake in various manners.

3.
At the moment, the government is about to mobilize more than ten thousand troops of the Self Defense Forces at the same time as hiding its lack of agenda and seeking to contain all criticisms against it. Meanwhile the media orchestrate a major yet empty campaign of “Save Japan,” whose tendency is toward nothing short of a new form of total mobilization that the people already experienced during the fascist regime. We consider this as a total collapse of the way the state and society had been organized up until 3/11.

4.
During our struggle to fight against the coerced removal and practices such as community kitchen in the past several years, we have been searching for a method by which the process of struggle itself contains germination of people’s society. This attempt has been just in an embryonic stage. Now we believe it necessary to concentrate our forces more than ever toward this goal in confrontation with the calamitous situation. This must entail a full-hearted rejection of restoration of the previous society, of reconstruction of the society based upon nuclear power, and a move toward creation of a society by and for the people.

5.
We know at the moment we are overwhelmingly weaker than the state project in terms of material power. But we might be able to surpass, if and only if we can gather the power of the many. We call for a collaboration of all of those individuals and movements who share the same intention as ours.

March 21st, 2011
Sanya Workers Welfare Center
Sanya Dispute League
Committee for Struggles Against Unemployment