Reuters
Mari Saito and Antoni Slodkowski
Dec. 31, 2013
Seiji Sasa hits the train station in this northern Japanese city before dawn most mornings to prowl for homeless men.
He isn't a social
worker. He's a recruiter. The men in Sendai Station are potential
laborers that Sasa can dispatch to contractors in Japan's nuclear
disaster zone for a bounty of $100 a head.
"This
is how labor recruiters like me come in every day," Sasa says, as he
strides past men sleeping on cardboard and clutching at their coats
against the early winter cold.
It's also how
Japan
finds people willing to accept minimum wage for one of the most
undesirable jobs in the industrialized world: working on the $35
billion, taxpayer-funded effort to clean up radioactive fallout across
an area of northern Japan larger than Hong Kong.
Almost
three years ago, a massive earthquake and tsunami leveled villages
across Japan's northeast coast and set off multiple meltdowns at the
Fukushima nuclear plant. Today, the most ambitious radiation clean-up
ever attempted is running behind schedule. The effort is being dogged by
both a lack of oversight and a shortage of workers, according to a
Reuters analysis of contracts and interviews with dozens of those
involved.
In January, October and November, Japanese gangsters were arrested on charges of infiltrating
construction giant Obayashi Corp's network of decontamination subcontractors and illegally sending workers to the government-funded project.
In
the October case, homeless men were rounded up at Sendai's train
station by Sasa, then put to work clearing radioactive soil and debris
in Fukushima City for less than minimum wage, according to police and
accounts of those involved. The men reported up through a chain of three
other companies to Obayashi, Japan's second-largest
construction company.
Obayashi,
which is one of more than 20 major contractors involved in
government-funded radiation removal projects, has not been accused of
any wrongdoing. But the spate of arrests has shown that members of
Japan's three largest criminal syndicates - Yamaguchi-gumi,
Sumiyoshi-kai and Inagawa-kai - had set up black-market recruiting
agencies under Obayashi.
"We
are taking it very seriously that these incidents keep happening one
after another," said Junichi Ichikawa, a spokesman for Obayashi. He said
the company tightened its scrutiny of its lower-tier subcontractors in
order to shut out gangsters, known as the yakuza. "There were elements
of what we had been doing that did not go far enough."
OVERSIGHT LEFT TO TOP CONTRACTORS
Part
of the problem in monitoring taxpayer money in Fukushima is the sheer
number of companies involved in decontamination, extending from the
major contractors at the top to tiny subcontractors many layers below
them. The total number has not been announced. But in the 10 most
contaminated towns and a highway that runs north past the gates of the
wrecked plant in Fukushima, Reuters found 733 companies were performing
work for the Ministry of Environment, according to partial contract
terms released by the ministry in August under Japan's information
disclosure law.
Reuters
found 56 subcontractors listed on environment ministry contracts worth a
total of $2.5 billion in the most radiated areas of Fukushima that
would have been barred from traditional public works because they had
not been vetted by the construction ministry.
The
2011 law that regulates decontamination put control under the
environment ministry, the largest spending program ever managed by the
10-year-old agency. The same law also effectively loosened controls on
bidders, making it possible for firms to win radiation removal contracts
without the basic disclosure and certification required for
participating in public works such as road construction.
Reuters
also found five firms working for the Ministry of Environment that
could not be identified.
They had no construction ministry registration,
no listed phone number or website, and Reuters could not find a basic
corporate registration disclosing ownership. There was also no record of
the firms in the database of Japan's largest credit research firm,
Teikoku Databank.
"As a
general matter, in cases like this, we would have to start by looking at
whether a company like this is real," said Shigenobu Abe, a researcher
at Teikoku Databank. "After that, it would be necessary to look at
whether this is an active company and at the background of its executive
and directors."
Responsibility
for monitoring the hiring, safety records and suitability of hundreds
of small firms involved in Fukushima's decontamination rests with the
top contractors, including Kajima Corp, Taisei Corp and Shimizu Corp,
officials said.
"In
reality, major contractors manage each work site," said Hide Motonaga,
deputy director of the radiation clean-up division of the environment
ministry.
But, as a
practical matter, many of the construction companies involved in the
clean-up say it is impossible to monitor what is happening on the ground
because of the multiple layers of contracts for each job that keep the
top contractors removed from those doing the work.
"If
you started looking at every single person, the project wouldn't move
forward. You wouldn't get a tenth of the people you need," said Yukio
Suganuma, president of Aisogo Service, a construction company that was
hired in 2012 to clean up radioactive fallout from streets in the town
of Tamura.
The sprawl of
small firms working in Fukushima is an unintended consequence of Japan's
legacy of tight labor-market regulations combined with the aging
population's deepening shortage of workers. Japan's construction
companies cannot afford to keep a large payroll and dispatching
temporary workers to construction sites is prohibited. As a result,
smaller firms step into the gap, promising workers in exchange for a cut
of their wages.
Below
these official subcontractors, a shadowy network of gangsters and
illegal brokers who hire homeless men has also become active in
Fukushima. Ministry of Environment contracts in the most radioactive
areas of Fukushima prefecture are particularly lucrative because the
government pays an additional $100 in hazard allowance per day for each
worker.
Takayoshi
Igarashi, a lawyer and professor at Hosei University, said the initial
rush to find companies for decontamination was understandable in the
immediate aftermath of the disaster when the priority was emergency
response. But he said the government now needs to tighten its scrutiny
to prevent a range of abuses, including bid rigging.
"There
are many unknown entities getting involved in decontamination
projects," said Igarashi, a former advisor to ex-Prime Minister Naoto
Kan. "There needs to be a thorough check on what companies are working
on what, and when. I think it's probably completely lawless if the top
contractors are not thoroughly checking."
The
Ministry of Environment announced on Thursday that work on the most
contaminated sites would take two to three years longer than the
original March 2014 deadline. That means many of the more than 60,000
who lived in the area before the disaster will remain unable to return
home until six years after the disaster.
Earlier
this month, Abe, who pledged his government would "take full
responsibility for the rebirth of Fukushima" boosted the budget for
decontamination to $35 billion, including funds to create a facility to
store radioactive soil and other waste near the wrecked nuclear plant.
‘DON'T ASK QUESTIONS'
Japan
has always had a gray market of day labor centered in Tokyo and Osaka. A
small army of day laborers was employed to build the stadiums and parks
for the 1964
Olympics
in Tokyo. But over the past year, Sendai, the biggest city in the
disaster zone, has emerged as a hiring hub for homeless men. Many work
clearing rubble left behind by the 2011 tsunami and cleaning up
radioactive hotspots by removing topsoil, cutting grass and scrubbing
down houses around the destroyed nuclear plant, workers and city
officials say.
Seiji
Sasa, 67, a broad-shouldered former wrestling promoter, was photographed
by undercover police recruiting homeless men at the Sendai train
station to work in the nuclear cleanup. The workers were then handed off
through a chain of companies reporting up to Obayashi, as part of a
$1.4 million contract to decontaminate roads in Fukushima, police say.
"I
don't ask questions; that's not my job," Sasa said in an interview with
Reuters. "I just find people and send them to work. I send them and get
money in exchange. That's it. I don't get involved in what happens
after that."
Only a third
of the money allocated for wages by Obayashi's top contractor made it
to the workers Sasa had found. The rest was skimmed by middlemen, police
say. After deductions for food and lodging, that left workers with an
hourly rate of about $6, just below the minimum wage equal to about
$6.50 per hour in Fukushima, according to wage data provided by police.
Some of the homeless men ended up in debt after fees for food and
housing were deducted, police say.
Sasa
was arrested in November and released without being charged. Police
were after his client, Mitsunori Nishimura, a local Inagawa-kai
gangster. Nishimura housed workers in cramped dorms on the edge of
Sendai and skimmed an estimated $10,000 of public funding intended for
their wages each month, police say.
Nishimura,
who could not be reached for comment, was arrested and paid a $2,500
fine. Nishimura is widely known in Sendai. Seiryu Home, a shelter funded
by the city, had sent other homeless men to work for him on recovery
jobs after the 2011 disaster.
"He
seemed like such a nice guy," said Yota Iozawa, a shelter manager. "It
was bad luck. I can't investigate everything about every company."
In
the incident that prompted his arrest, Nishimura placed his workers
with Shinei Clean, a company with about 15 employees based on a winding
farm road south of Sendai. Police turned up there to arrest Shinei's
president, Toshiaki Osada, after a search of his office, according to
Tatsuya Shoji, who is both Osada's nephew and a company manager. Shinei
had sent dump trucks to sort debris from the disaster. "Everyone is
involved in sending workers," said Shoji. "I guess we just happened to
get caught this time."
Osada, who could not be reached for comment, was fined about $5,000. Shinei was also fined about $5,000.
'RUN BY GANGS'
The
trail from Shinei led police to a slightly larger neighboring company
with about 30 employees, Fujisai Couken. Fujisai says it was under
pressure from a larger contractor, Raito Kogyo, to provide workers for
Fukushima. Kenichi Sayama, Fujisai's general manger, said his company
only made about $10 per day per worker it outsourced. When the job
appeared to be going too slowly, Fujisai asked Shinei for more help and
they turned to Nishimura.
A Fujisai manager, Fuminori Hayashi, was arrested and paid a $5,000 fine, police said. Fujisai also paid a $5,000 fine.
"If
you don't get involved (with gangs), you're not going to get enough
workers," said Sayama, Fujisai's general manager. "The construction
industry is 90 percent run by gangs."
Raito
Kogyo, a top-tier subcontractor to Obayashi, has about 300 workers in
decontamination projects around Fukushima and owns subsidiaries in both
Japan and the United States. Raito agreed that the project faced a
shortage of workers but said it had been deceived. Raito said it was
unaware of a shadow contractor under Fujisai tied to organized crime.
"We can only check on lower-tier subcontractors if they are honest with us," said Tomoyuki Yamane, head of
marketing for Raito. Raito and Obayashi were not accused of any wrongdoing and were not penalized.
Other
firms receiving government contracts in the decontamination zone have
hired homeless men from Sasa, including Shuto Kogyo, a firm based in
Himeji, western Japan.
"He
sends people in, but they don't stick around for long," said Fujiko
Kaneda, 70, who runs Shuto with her son, Seiki Shuto. "He gathers people
in front of the station and sends them to our dorm."
Kaneda
invested about $600,000 to cash in on the reconstruction boom. Shuto
converted an abandoned roadhouse north of Sendai into a dorm to house
workers on reconstruction jobs such as clearing tsunami debris. The
company also won two contracts awarded by the Ministry of Environment to
clean up two of the most heavily contaminated townships.
Kaneda
had been arrested in 2009 along with her son, Seiki, for charging
illegally high interest rates on loans to pensioners. Kaneda signed an
admission of guilt for police, a document she says she did not
understand, and paid a fine of $8,000. Seiki was given a sentence of two
years prison time suspended for four years and paid a $20,000 fine,
according to police. Seiki declined to comment.
UNPAID WAGE CLAIMS
In
Fukushima, Shuto has faced at least two claims with local labor
regulators over unpaid wages, according to Kaneda. In a separate case, a
55-year-old homeless man reported being paid the equivalent of $10 for a
full month of work at Shuto. The worker's paystub, reviewed by Reuters,
showed charges for food, accommodation and laundry were docked from his
monthly pay equivalent to about $1,500, leaving him with $10 at the end
of the August.
The man
turned up broke and homeless at Sendai Station in October after working
for Shuto, but disappeared soon afterwards, according to Yasuhiro Aoki, a
Baptist pastor and homeless advocate.
Kaneda
confirmed the man had worked for her but said she treats her workers
fairly. She said Shuto Kogyo pays workers at least $80 for a day's work
while docking the equivalent of $35 for food. Many of her workers end up
borrowing from her to make ends meet, she said. One of them had owed
her $20,000 before beginning work in Fukushima, she says. The balance
has come down recently, but then he borrowed another $2,000 for the
year-end holidays.
"He will never be able to pay me back," she said.
The
problem of workers running themselves into debt is widespread. "Many
homeless people are just put into dormitories, and the fees for lodging
and food are automatically docked from their wages," said Aoki, the
pastor. "Then at the end of the month, they're left with no pay at all."
Shizuya
Nishiyama, 57, says he briefly worked for Shuto clearing rubble. He now
sleeps on a cardboard box in Sendai Station. He says he left after a
dispute over wages, one of several he has had with construction firms,
including two handling decontamination jobs.
Nishiyama's
first employer in Sendai offered him $90 a day for his first job
clearing tsunami debris. But he was made to pay as much as $50 a day for
food and lodging. He also was not paid on the days he was unable to
work. On those days, though, he would still be charged for room and
board. He decided he was better off living on the street than going into
debt.
"We're an easy
target for recruiters," Nishiyama said. "We turn up here with all our
bags, wheeling them around and we're easy to spot. They say to us, are
you looking for work? Are you hungry? And if we haven't eaten, they
offer to find us a job."
(Reporting
by Mari Saito and Antoni Slodkowski, additional reporting by Elena
Johansson, Michio Kohno, Yoko Matsudaira, Fumika Inoue, Ruairidh Villar,
Sophie Knight; writing by Kevin Krolicki; editing by Bill Tarrant)
