Govt Finds School Program Violates Law after Accident in Okinawa

Tokyo, May 22 (Jiji Press)–The Japanese government said Friday that a high school program violated the basic education law, following a fatal accident in Okinawa Prefecture, southernmost Japan, in March. In its report on the accident, the education ministry said that the school program about the relocation of the U.S. Marine Corps’ Futenma air station in Ginowan, Okinawa, to the Henoko coastal area in Nago in the same prefecture violated the law, which mandates political neutrality. On March 16, two small boats capsized off Henoko during a study trip by Doshisha International Senior High School in the western Japan prefecture of Kyoto. The accident resulted in the deaths of Hajime Kanai, 71, the captain of one of the boats, and Tomoka Takeishi, a 17-year-old second-year female student of the school aboard the other vessel. It is the first time since the current basic education law was enacted that the education ministry has found a case in violation of the law on the grounds of political neutrality. In the report, the ministry criticized the school’s safety management as “extremely inappropriate,” noting that it failed to conduct preliminary inspections and that no supervising teachers accompanied the students on the day of the boat tour. It issued a notice to the Doshisha incorporated educational institution, which operates the high school, and to the Kyoto prefectural government, which has jurisdiction over the school, urging improvements. Education minister Yohei Matsumoto told a press conference Friday, “There are big problems with the educational institution’s management system and with the school’s governance, and their responsibility is extremely heavy.” He also disclosed plans to soon conduct a survey of schools nationwide on safety in off-campus activities and the state of educational programs. Kyoto Governor Takatoshi Nishiwaki told a regular news conference, “We have no choice but to reduce” the prefectural government’s subsidies for the operating costs of the private high school, which amount to approximately 200 million annually. On April 24, the ministry dispatched officials to the Doshisha incorporated educational institution to interview Eiji Hatta, who chairs its Board of Trustees, and Kikuo Nishida, principal of the high school, regarding safety controls, the history of study trips, and educational activities. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]