nuclear-news

Fukushima: 11 evacuated cities and towns, but their people will vote in elections

All of the parties and groups involved in the Fukushima assembly election said last month that they wanted nuclear power to be phased out……

For as long as they remain uninhabitable and their residents dispersed, the future of the contaminated areas will be clouded by uncertainty. …

Japan’s nuclear disaster towns hold remote local elections Guardian UK, 20 Nov 11 Evacuated residents from Okuma and Futaba in Fukushima plant exclusion zone ballot for regional assemblies from afar  They have been deserted for eight months, and could stay that way for years, their former inhabitants now scattered around north-east Japan.

But the towns of Okuma and Futaba, located in the shadow of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, have shown that civic life must go on, even in the wake of a major nuclear accident. In one of the more surreal episodes of world democracy, tens of thousands were eligible to vote on Sunday for regional assemblies and mayors in towns that have all but ceased to exist.

Fukushima is the last of the three hardest-hit prefectures to go have gone to the polls since elections were postponed after the 11 March tsunami. Elections in Japan are usually characterised by early-morning speeches outside railway stations and last-ditch appeals for support from candidates perched atop campaign vehicles. Their faces, accompanied by pithy slogans, stare out from numerous billboards.

But none of that was evident in the 11 cities, towns and villages that lie inside the 12-mile exclusion zone imposed around Fukushima Daiichi in March.

Residents of Futaba and Okuma, which were electing mayors and assembly members on Sunday, have only been permitted brief visits home since the disaster to survey the damage and retrieve valuables and heirlooms.

Of the 80,000 people evacuated from the no-go zone, 58,000 are reportedly living in other prefectures, creating a logistical nightmare for officials who have had to oversee candidacy applications in temporary offices far from the election battlegrounds…..

The campaign has been dominated by the slow pace of decontamination efforts and financial aid for the tens of thousands of people whose lives have been put on hold since March.

All of the parties and groups involved in the Fukushima assembly election said last month that they wanted nuclear power to be phased out……

For as long as they remain uninhabitable and their residents dispersed, the future of the contaminated areas will be clouded by uncertainty. …

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/20/japan-nuclear-disaster-towns-elections

November 21, 2011 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | - Fukushima 2011