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Editorial: More discussion needed to prevent state secrets bill from destroying democracy Printer friendly page Print This
By Editorial
Mainichi Japan
Sunday, Dec 1, 2013

The ruling coalition's ramming of a controversial special state secrets bill, which would impose harsh penalties on those who leak classified government information, through the House of Representatives on Nov. 26 has stunned the public.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was absent from the chamber's special committee on national security when it approved the bill. Since the voting session was aired live, the ruling coalition comprised of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the New Komeito party reportedly decided not to show the public that it rammed the bill through in the presence of the prime minister.

This has suggested that even the ruling bloc cannot take pride in the passage of the bill through the powerful chamber. During a public hearing in Fukushima the previous day, all the attendees demanded that the bill be either scrapped or deliberated cautiously. However, such desperate calls from the area affected by the nuclear crisis did not reach the legislative branch of the government.

The bill cleared the lower house after only 20 days of deliberations. The bill does not clearly show the scope of information that could be classified as special state secrets, and the legislative and judicial branches cannot check classified government information. Moreover, a decision on rules on releasing declassified information will be made sometime later.

Ensuring that members of the public can access government information is one of the key basics of a democratic society. However, if the bill is to be enacted and come into force, it could discourage citizens as well as journalists from seeking access to such information for fear of harsh punishment, blocking government information from circulating in society. The Diet failed to thoroughly deliberate the bill to clarify these problems. Flaws in the bill are beginning to surface one after another.

The prime minister failed to provide a sufficient explanation of the bill during the campaign for the House of Councillors election in July this year and made no mention of the legislation in his policy speech at the outset of the ongoing Diet session. Nevertheless, the Abe administration is now taking a tough line in a bid to ensure the bill becomes law during the current Diet session that ends on Dec. 6. This highlights the arrogance that the ruling coalition is now showing only four months after it regained a majority in the upper chamber, which had been controlled by opposition parties, in the July poll.

A few opposition parties further tainted the issue by reaching a compromise with the government over the bill in an easy-going manner. An agreement that the coalition reached with the Japan Restoration Party (JRP) and Your Party to revise the bill has not changed its core elements at all. The ruling bloc agreed to consider setting up a third-party organization to examine whether the government's classification of internal information as special secrets is appropriate, as demanded by the JRP, but stopped short of pledging to establish such an independent panel.

As a result of their negotiations, some clauses of the bill have even worsened, such as the extension of the maximum period during which government information could be classified as special secrets to 60 years. As such, these parties could be regarded as nothing but forces complementary to the ruling parties.

Although the bill cleared the lower house, legislators should scrutinize whether such legislation is truly necessary once again.

It is understandable for the government to classify information that could pose a threat to national security over a certain period.

Currently, the National Public Service Act, the Self-Defense Forces Act and the legislation on the protection of secrets regarding the U.S. and Japan Mutual Defense Assistance Agreement specifically outlaw leaks of government information. Those who leak confidential information face up to one, five and 10 years in prison, respectively, under these laws.

The government has officially confirmed that there have been five serious cases in which public servants leaked classified information over the past 15 years. Defendants in these cases either evaded indictment or were handed prison terms far shorter than the maximum terms provided for under these three laws.

The government should place priority on creating systems in all the administrative organs to prevent confidential information from leaking and ensure all officials abide by the rules on information management.

Under the bill, information on defense, diplomacy and national security as well as that regarding the prevention of terrorist attacks could be classified as special state secrets. Investigations into offenses that have disrupted public security -- which center on surveillance activity -- could restrict the human rights of members of the public.

Serious questions remain as to whether such new legislation should be created even if it raises the possibility that citizens will be punished for attempting to gain access to government information.

The bill would neither sufficiently guarantee people's right to know nor establish a system to check information designated as secrets. There are numerous other problems with the bill.

The upper house should hold thorough discussions to highlight problems involving the bill instead of making haste to pass it into law, and clearly show the danger that the bill poses to the public.

Source: Mainichi Japan



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