{"id":12515,"date":"2014-07-13T12:12:25","date_gmt":"2014-07-13T22:12:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=12515"},"modified":"2014-07-13T12:14:42","modified_gmt":"2014-07-13T22:14:42","slug":"jdriver-on-j-driver-licenses-and-questionable-legality-of-residencygaijin-card-checks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=12515","title":{"rendered":"JDriver on J Driver License renewals and questionable legality of residency\/Gaijin Card checks to ferret out “illegal overstayers”"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Hi Blog. We’ve discussed on Debito.org before the rigmarole of NJ drivers in Japan getting J Driver Licenses, being subjected to extra intrusive procedures that are of questionable legality<\/a>. Well, a Debito.org Reader decided to do his civic duty and ask for some reasons why. And this is what he found out. Read on and feel free to contribute your own experiences. Dr. ARUDOU, Debito<\/p>\n

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\nJuly 13, 2014<\/strong>
\nHi Debito, I’m a long time reader, but rarely have time to comment. I’ve had a pretty disheartening, if not entirely surprising, experience recently when I went to renew my drivers license and thought I’d share it with you and perhaps your readers if you find it worthwhile to share. <\/em><\/p>\n

As you might know, residents of foreign citizenship (\u5916\u56fd\u7c4d\u306e\u65b9 in the bureaucratic parlance) are required to show their residence cards or in other way demonstrate their status of residence when getting or renewing their drivers license. Obedient citizen as I am, of course I went along with it and presented it when asked, but I did make clear I would like to be clarified on the legal basis for such a request. I didn’t expect that the person doing the registration would know something like this off the top of their head, but I was intended on talking to someone eventually who could point to this and that paragraph of this or that law that governs these circumstances.<\/em><\/p>\n

So after all the procedure was finished and I got my license, I went to the window I was told I’d get my questions answered. The first person could only, after quite a while, produce the Immigration law article 23, which only says that you are in general required to present the passport or the residence card when the police and other authorities ask for it “in the execution of their duties.” So I asked for a specific law or ordinance that shows that in this concrete case it is indeed their duty to ask for the card. I got sent to her boss, who again only wasted my time with the same answer (Immigration law) and got irritated and dismissed me, but not before arranging for me to see the final boss of bosses, who should be able to answer my, I thought very simple, question i.e. what is the legal basis for what you’re doing?<\/em><\/p>\n

Neither the last guy could legitimize the demand in legal terms, so we agreed that he will research it and call me later to let me know. He did call later the same day, only to tell me that after all, the legal basis would have to be in the Immigration law, because he couldn’t find any other! He said it is all done to prevent the “illegal overstayers” from getting drivers license, as if that, or any other goal, would justify working outside of legal framework.<\/em><\/p>\n

I was flabbergasted that apparently no one in the whole Koto drivers center (\u6c5f\u6771\u8a66\u9a13\u5834) knew the legal basis of their actions. I understand the receptionists, but I went four stages up their hierarchy and still nobody could justify their demands in legal terms. I’ve read the law on traffic before I went there and knew it did not specify this (\u9053\u8def\u4ea4\u901a\u6cd5 http:\/\/law.e-gov.go.jp\/htmldata\/S35\/S35HO105.html<\/a>) but I revisited it again afterwards. Neither it, nor the other major traffic law (\u9053\u8def\u6cd5 http:\/\/law.e-gov.go.jp\/htmldata\/S27\/S27HO180.html<\/a>) even mention status of residence or residence cards at all, and most certainly not when specifying the circumstances in which the authorities can refuse to issue you the license (physically unfit, alcoholism etc) It actually specifically states that they must issue you the permit if these do not apply, and you’ve passed the test<\/em> (Article 90
\n\u516c\u5b89\u59d4\u54e1\u4f1a\u306f\u3001\u524d\u6761\u7b2c\u4e00\u9805\u306e\u904b\u8ee2\u514d\u8a31\u8a66\u9a13\u306b\u5408\u683c\u3057\u305f\u8005\uff08\u5f53\u8a72\u904b\u8ee2\u514d\u8a31\u8a66\u9a13\u306b\u4fc2\u308b\u9069\u6027\u8a66\u9a13\u3092\u53d7\u3051\u305f\u65e5\u304b\u3089\u8d77\u7b97\u3057\u3066\u3001\u7b2c\u4e00\u7a2e\u514d\u8a31\u53c8\u306f\u7b2c\u4e8c\u7a2e\u514d\u8a31\u306b\u3042\u3064\u3066\u306f\u4e00\u5e74\u3092\u3001\u4eee\u514d\u8a31\u306b\u3042\u3064\u3066\u306f\u4e09\u6708\u3092\u7d4c\u904e\u3057\u3066\u3044\u306a\u3044\u8005\u306b\u9650\u308b\u3002\uff09\u306b\u5bfe\u3057\u3001\u514d\u8a31\u3092\u4e0e\u3048\u306a\u3051\u308c\u3070\u306a\u3089\u306a\u3044\u3002)<\/p>\n

So I am now faced with an inevitable conclusion that they asking for residence cards is likely ILLEGAL. Of course, this is a condition which only applies to foreign residents, so it is unlikely to cause a national uproar, but it is nevertheless very unsettling, and not only for NJ, which might be the primary target at present. My biggest problem in all this is that they seemed genuinely baffled that someone is asking for a legal basis for their conduct, and the inability of the whole place to come up with a justification. It seems to me the bureaucracy is very much used to acting outside the legal framework, or at the very least, do not think of their daily work as something done only on the firm basis of law.<\/em><\/p>\n

I would be very much interested to hear your and your readers thoughts and perhaps similar experiences. I am seriously considering refusing to show the card next time, but bring the printed letter of the law which says they are obliged to issue me with a permit.<\/em><\/p>\n

Sincerely, JDriver<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We’ve discussed on Debito.org before the rigmarole of NJ drivers in Japan getting J Driver Licenses, being subjected to extra intrusive procedures that are of questionable legality. Well, a Debito.org Reader decided to do his civic duty and ask for some reasons why. And this is what he found out. Read on and feel free to contribute your own experiences.<\/p>\n

JDriver: As you might know, residents of foreign citizenship (\u5916\u56fd\u7c4d\u306e\u65b9 in the bureaucratic parlance) are required to show their residence cards or in other way demonstrate their status of residence when getting or renewing their drivers license. Obedient citizen as I am, of course I went along with it and presented it when asked, but I did make clear I would like to be clarified on the legal basis for such a request. I didn’t expect that the person doing the registration would know something like this off the top of their head, but I was intended on talking to someone eventually who could point to this and that paragraph of this or that law that governs these circumstances.<\/p>\n

So after all the procedure was finished and I got my license, I went to the window I was told I’d get my questions answered. The first person could only, after quite a while, produce the Immigration law article 23, which only says that you are in general required to present the passport or the residence card when the police and other authorities ask for it “in the execution of their duties.” So I asked for a specific law or ordinance that shows that in this concrete case it is indeed their duty to ask for the card. I got sent to her boss, who again only wasted my time with the same answer (Immigration law) and got irritated and dismissed me, but not before arranging for me to see the final boss of bosses, who should be able to answer my, I thought very simple, question i.e. what is the legal basis for what you’re doing?<\/p>\n

Neither the last guy could legitimize the demand in legal terms, so we agreed that he will research it and call me later to let me know. He did call later the same day, only to tell me that after all, the legal basis would have to be in the Immigration law, because he couldn’t find any other! He said it is all done to prevent the “illegal overstayers” from getting drivers license, as if that, or any other goal, would justify working outside of legal framework. I was flabbergasted that apparently no one in the whole Koto drivers center (\u6c5f\u6771\u8a66\u9a13\u5834) knew the legal basis of their actions…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54,44,33,12,4,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pinprick-protests","category-discussions","category-fingerprinting-nj","category-immigration-assimilation","category-japanese-government","category-8"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12515\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}