The Yomiuri Shimbun
A bill to be submitted by the Justice Ministry to an upcoming Diet session to revise the Civil Code will require married couples who have chosen to use separate surnames to ensure their children use the names of either their mothers or fathers, according to a draft of the bill obtained by The Yomiuri Shimbun.
The bill also will raise the legal age to consent to marriage for girls from 16 to 18.
The ministry plans to submit the bill to an ordinary Diet session to be convened Monday. The ministry plans to begin negotiating with the ruling parties in an attempt to gain the Cabinet's approval of the bill in March.
In past bills submitted by the Democratic Party of Japan in regard to surnames for children whose parents each have a different name, the then opposition party wanted to allow children to have different names.
But the Legislative Council, an advisory panel for the justice minister, concluded in 1996 that siblings should have the same family names, even when their parents don't.
Justice Minister Keiko Chiba has been an advocate of a system that would allow women to retain their maiden names after marriage and played a leading role in the submission of the DPJ's past bills.
But political observers say she changed her stance due to criticism that separate names for children would dissolve family unity and because she placed priority on the passage of a bill.
In addition to the use of separate surnames, the revision also proposes that:
-- The age of consent for girls for marriage be raised from 16 to 18, in line with the law for boys.
-- Inheritance rights be made universal for children. The current law guarantees children born out of wedlock only half of what they are entitled to if they are born to married parents.
-- Women be allowed to remarry 100 days after their divorce is finalized, down from the current 180 days.
However, inside the ruling camp, Shizuka Kamei, minister of state for financial services and leader of the People's New Party, is vocally opposed to the separate surname system.
(Jan. 12, 2010)
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
(Japanese) PM to double number of advisers
The Yomiuri Shimbun
Government and ruling coalition Democratic Party of Japan leaders on Monday decided to double the maximum number of advisers to the prime minister from five to 10, in an effort to strengthen the functions of the Prime Minister's Office.
At a special meeting between government and DPJ leaders held at the Prime Minister's Office, they also decided that five additional advisers would be appointed from the private sector.
They also decided to add three senior vice ministers and 12 parliamentary secretaries to boost the number of politicians in the government, as part of efforts to enhance politicians' initiative in the government's decision-making.
The number of politicians' posts in the government will be 94, at maximum, when the new measure takes effect as the leaders hope in April. To this end, they plan to submit bills to revise related laws, such as the Diet Law and the National Government Organization Law, to the ordinary Diet session to be convened Monday.
The meeting was attended by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, Deputy Prime Minister Naoto Kan and Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano from the government, and from the DPJ, Secretary General Ichiro Ozawa, Azuma Koshiishi, chief of the party's House of Councillors caucus, and Diet Affairs Committee Chairman Kenji Yamaoka.
The attendees agreed to hold similar meetings of party and government leaders once a week in principle.
After the meeting, Hirano told reporters that boosting the number of advisers to the prime minister was needed to strengthen the staff supporting the prime minister.
In its manifesto for the 2009 House of Representative election, the DPJ said it would boost the number of politicians in the government to about 100. However, the latest move will fail to satisfy the target.
At the meeting, Hatoyama asked the participants to work hard to quickly pass the second supplementary budget for fiscal 2009 and the fiscal 2010 budget. "As the economy is in such a [bad] situation, please do your best to pass them [the budget]," he said.
The participants agreed to make a special effort to have the budgets approved quickly by the Diet.
"I ask the government to make preparations to have the budgets executable quickly after the bills are passed," Ozawa said.
They confirmed that the government would submit to the ordinary Diet session a bill to grant foreign permanent residents the right to vote in local elections.
(Jan. 12, 2010)
Government and ruling coalition Democratic Party of Japan leaders on Monday decided to double the maximum number of advisers to the prime minister from five to 10, in an effort to strengthen the functions of the Prime Minister's Office.
At a special meeting between government and DPJ leaders held at the Prime Minister's Office, they also decided that five additional advisers would be appointed from the private sector.
They also decided to add three senior vice ministers and 12 parliamentary secretaries to boost the number of politicians in the government, as part of efforts to enhance politicians' initiative in the government's decision-making.
The number of politicians' posts in the government will be 94, at maximum, when the new measure takes effect as the leaders hope in April. To this end, they plan to submit bills to revise related laws, such as the Diet Law and the National Government Organization Law, to the ordinary Diet session to be convened Monday.
The meeting was attended by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, Deputy Prime Minister Naoto Kan and Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano from the government, and from the DPJ, Secretary General Ichiro Ozawa, Azuma Koshiishi, chief of the party's House of Councillors caucus, and Diet Affairs Committee Chairman Kenji Yamaoka.
The attendees agreed to hold similar meetings of party and government leaders once a week in principle.
After the meeting, Hirano told reporters that boosting the number of advisers to the prime minister was needed to strengthen the staff supporting the prime minister.
In its manifesto for the 2009 House of Representative election, the DPJ said it would boost the number of politicians in the government to about 100. However, the latest move will fail to satisfy the target.
At the meeting, Hatoyama asked the participants to work hard to quickly pass the second supplementary budget for fiscal 2009 and the fiscal 2010 budget. "As the economy is in such a [bad] situation, please do your best to pass them [the budget]," he said.
The participants agreed to make a special effort to have the budgets approved quickly by the Diet.
"I ask the government to make preparations to have the budgets executable quickly after the bills are passed," Ozawa said.
They confirmed that the government would submit to the ordinary Diet session a bill to grant foreign permanent residents the right to vote in local elections.
(Jan. 12, 2010)
Nation set to reduce targets for education
Tuesday, 12 January 2010 15:03
The Phnom Penh Post
Sebastian Strangio and Cheang Sokha
Photo by: Heng Chivoan
Students study at Toun Fha primary school near Kandal Market. A draft of the government’s forthcoming National Strategic Development Plan includes revised education targets.
CAMBODIA is set to slash education targets under its new development plan, abandoning benchmarks that education specialists have described as “completely unrealistic”.
According to a draft of the country’s National Strategic Development Plan (NSDP) update for 2009-13, a copy of which was obtained by the Post Monday, a wide range of education targets would be cut considerably, thereby lessening the country’s chances of fulfilling its education-related Millennium Development Goal (MDG).
The NSDP for 2006-10 aimed at achieving universal enrolment at both the primary and lower secondary levels by 2015, a goal that was in line with the MDG benchmarks. The new plan, however, would lower the target for lower secondary enrolment from 75 percent by 2010 to just 51 percent by the 2013-14 school year.
In The, spokesman for the Ministry of Education, said that in previous plans, figures had been drawn from national directives, but that the new figures reflect more detailed analysis conducted by the ministry itself.
“In previous planning, we did not make specific analysis,” he said. “In the draft we have made a clear and fair analysis based on the current situation and adjusted the ministry’s targets and its implementation goals.”
The goal of 50 percent enrolment in rural areas by 2010 would likewise be reduced to 42 percent by 2013-14, while the same goal in “remote” areas – for which the 2006-10 document set a target of 50 percent by 2010 – would be set at 22 percent for 2013-14. Completion rates for lower secondary school would also be reduced from 76 percent by 2010 to 59 percent by 2013-14, and the target literacy rate for those aged between 15 and 24 would be dropped from 95 percent by 2010 to 92 percent by 2013-14.
Education specialists applauded the adjustments, saying they were a clear improvement over the wildly optimistic MDG targets contained in the 2006-10 plan.
“The way [the targets] were set was completely unrealistic,” said Sherif Rushdy, a consultant who conducted an assessment of the MDG benchmarks for the UN Development Programme last year.
“If the goal is not achievable, there’s not much incentive to achieve it.”
Rushdy said that many of the MDG targets for education, set by the government in 2003, were not backed up by enough analysis to determine whether they were feasible.
“You can’t achieve 100 percent primary enrolment and 100 percent secondary enrolment in the same time frame. And there was no projection made of what it actually takes to get there,” he said, adding that it was “reasonable to adjust the figures to something that’s more realistic”.
In Samrithy, executive director of NGO Education Partnership, agreed.
“In the previous [plan], it seems the government tried to play up the numbers to show they were trying to reach the goal as quickly as possible,” he said, adding that the inflated goals were “beyond the government’s capacity”.
Short on time
As the deadline for public consultations on the NSDP draft closed on Monday, civil society groups criticised the government for the length and timing of the consultative period, saying they were not given enough of a chance to make submissions about the 200-page document.
The NSDP draft was originally released to NGOs on December 17 for perusal, but the three-week period for making formal submissions about the contents of the draft was too short, Chith Sam Ath, executive director of NGO Forum, said on Monday.
“NGOs realise the importance of the NSDP update,” he said, but added that the consultative period was “clearly too short to have a proper consultative process”.
“The consultative process excluded many civil society organisations from taking part,” he said.
Others questioned the timing of the consultation period, which was disrupted by the Christmas and New Year holidays. “Given the holiday period and everything, it was just not sufficient for NGOs and donors to make their submissions,” said Lun Borithy, executive director of the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia.
“It’s an important document that will be a road map for the government between now and 2013, so it’s important that broad consultation is conducted.”
But Theng Pagnathun, deputy director general at the Ministry of Planning, which has been responsible for formulating the NSDP draft, said the concerns came only from a small number of civil society groups.
“Only some NGOs have complained that we did not give them enough time, but I think that they weren’t working at that time. Maybe they were on holiday,” he said.
He added that government institutions and their “main development partners” had made no complaints about the timing of the consultation period.
“We were aware about [NGO] concerns on this issue, but we work based on a majority of voices,” he said. “The government will not postpone its deadline.”
The Phnom Penh Post
Sebastian Strangio and Cheang Sokha
Photo by: Heng ChivoanStudents study at Toun Fha primary school near Kandal Market. A draft of the government’s forthcoming National Strategic Development Plan includes revised education targets.
CAMBODIA is set to slash education targets under its new development plan, abandoning benchmarks that education specialists have described as “completely unrealistic”.
According to a draft of the country’s National Strategic Development Plan (NSDP) update for 2009-13, a copy of which was obtained by the Post Monday, a wide range of education targets would be cut considerably, thereby lessening the country’s chances of fulfilling its education-related Millennium Development Goal (MDG).
The NSDP for 2006-10 aimed at achieving universal enrolment at both the primary and lower secondary levels by 2015, a goal that was in line with the MDG benchmarks. The new plan, however, would lower the target for lower secondary enrolment from 75 percent by 2010 to just 51 percent by the 2013-14 school year.
In The, spokesman for the Ministry of Education, said that in previous plans, figures had been drawn from national directives, but that the new figures reflect more detailed analysis conducted by the ministry itself.
“In previous planning, we did not make specific analysis,” he said. “In the draft we have made a clear and fair analysis based on the current situation and adjusted the ministry’s targets and its implementation goals.”
The goal of 50 percent enrolment in rural areas by 2010 would likewise be reduced to 42 percent by 2013-14, while the same goal in “remote” areas – for which the 2006-10 document set a target of 50 percent by 2010 – would be set at 22 percent for 2013-14. Completion rates for lower secondary school would also be reduced from 76 percent by 2010 to 59 percent by 2013-14, and the target literacy rate for those aged between 15 and 24 would be dropped from 95 percent by 2010 to 92 percent by 2013-14.
Education specialists applauded the adjustments, saying they were a clear improvement over the wildly optimistic MDG targets contained in the 2006-10 plan.
“The way [the targets] were set was completely unrealistic,” said Sherif Rushdy, a consultant who conducted an assessment of the MDG benchmarks for the UN Development Programme last year.
“If the goal is not achievable, there’s not much incentive to achieve it.”
Rushdy said that many of the MDG targets for education, set by the government in 2003, were not backed up by enough analysis to determine whether they were feasible.
“You can’t achieve 100 percent primary enrolment and 100 percent secondary enrolment in the same time frame. And there was no projection made of what it actually takes to get there,” he said, adding that it was “reasonable to adjust the figures to something that’s more realistic”.
In Samrithy, executive director of NGO Education Partnership, agreed.
“In the previous [plan], it seems the government tried to play up the numbers to show they were trying to reach the goal as quickly as possible,” he said, adding that the inflated goals were “beyond the government’s capacity”.
Short on time
As the deadline for public consultations on the NSDP draft closed on Monday, civil society groups criticised the government for the length and timing of the consultative period, saying they were not given enough of a chance to make submissions about the 200-page document.
The NSDP draft was originally released to NGOs on December 17 for perusal, but the three-week period for making formal submissions about the contents of the draft was too short, Chith Sam Ath, executive director of NGO Forum, said on Monday.
“NGOs realise the importance of the NSDP update,” he said, but added that the consultative period was “clearly too short to have a proper consultative process”.
“The consultative process excluded many civil society organisations from taking part,” he said.
Others questioned the timing of the consultation period, which was disrupted by the Christmas and New Year holidays. “Given the holiday period and everything, it was just not sufficient for NGOs and donors to make their submissions,” said Lun Borithy, executive director of the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia.
“It’s an important document that will be a road map for the government between now and 2013, so it’s important that broad consultation is conducted.”
But Theng Pagnathun, deputy director general at the Ministry of Planning, which has been responsible for formulating the NSDP draft, said the concerns came only from a small number of civil society groups.
“Only some NGOs have complained that we did not give them enough time, but I think that they weren’t working at that time. Maybe they were on holiday,” he said.
He added that government institutions and their “main development partners” had made no complaints about the timing of the consultation period.
“We were aware about [NGO] concerns on this issue, but we work based on a majority of voices,” he said. “The government will not postpone its deadline.”
Na'vi ascendant as Cambodia's languages face extinction
Tue, 12 Jan 2010
DPA
Phnom Penh - The world's rich array of languages is shrinking, UNESCO said, with one language becoming extinct every two weeks. By the end of the century, the UN's cultural body said it expected today's 6,700 languages to be halved. With them will go untold cultural diversity. It is a bleak tale and seemingly unstoppable although not every endangered language is on UNESCO's list. One called Na'vi even has its own listing on Wikipedia, where its 23-page entry covers pronunciation and grammar to frustrate the most talented linguist.
But Na'vi, whose name will be familiar to many moviegoers, is a fiction: It was invented for James Cameron's blockbuster movie Avatar, and even the US language professor who created Na'vi cannot speak it fluently. Technically, that makes Na'vi extinct, although its inventor has high hopes it would catch on.
At the other end of the spectrum is S'aoch, an ethnic minority language spoken in southern Cambodia that experts said predates Na'vi by 6,000 years. S'aoch is at least a working language with 10 fluent speakers.
But there is no Wikipedia page for S'aoch, which is on the verge of extinction. Given that there are people who speak Klingon, a language invented for the Star Trek films, and that Avatar is now the second-highest-grossing movie in history, there is a good chance Na'vi would be spoken long after S'aoch is gone.
Jean-Michel Filippi, a linguistics professor based in Cambodia, is S'aoch's most passionate supporter, having studied the language for 10 years and transcribed more than 4,000 words, which incidentally is four times the vocabulary of the Na'vi language.
He is the first to admit S'aoch has no chance. The village of Samrong Loeu, where the last speakers live, has 110 inhabitants. Just 10 are fluent, but none uses the language. Filippi stressed the lack of speakers is not solely to blame.
"Survival depends on one thing: Does the minority want to protect and save its own culture?" he said.
In the case of S'aoch, the answer is that they do not. After the fall of the Khmer Rouge in 1979, the S'aoch-speaking people were unable to return to their original village, so they ended up in Samrong Loeu with no land and are consequently poor. They see around them Khmer-speaking people with land and relative wealth and, not surprisingly, aspire to be like them.
"When you are put in a position of economic inferiority, you tend to reject your own culture," Filippi said.
S'aoch is an ancient tongue and is related to minority tongues in India and Malaysia as well as to modern Khmer. It predates the famous temples of Angkor Wat in the country's west and is also one of 19 Cambodian languages UNESCO said are at risk of extinction.
Filippi explained why the number of speakers matters less to a language's survival than one might think. Another endangered language, Somray, which is spoken by a few hundred people in western Cambodia, stands a much better chance because the villagers need the language for prayers used in their animist religious services.
"If the prayers are pronounced badly, then they won't work, so they want their children to learn the language," he said.
Blaise Kilian, UNESCO's joint programme coordinator in Phnom Penh, said an array of factors conspire to kill languages, the most obvious being too few people fluent in the tongue.
"You also have the environment and the way people themselves, especially the new generation, react to the changing environment and how much they are interested in preserving and transmitting their own language," Kilian said.
The imminent demise of S'aoch raises the question of what can be done about Cambodia's other endangered languages. Kilian said the outlook is bleak for many.
In the case of S'aoch, the only option is to do what Filippi is doing: write down and record as much of the language as possible while its remaining speakers are alive.
Some of Cambodia's languages are more widely spoken, and steps such as broadcasting radio programmes in minority languages do help - something UNESCO and the government do in the north-eastern provinces of Ratanakkiri and Mondolkiri.
Bilingual education in schools is also important, which is what the international charity Care has done in Cambodia's north-east in conjunction with the Education Ministry. Ron Watt, Care's education adviser, said the 7-year-old programme covers almost 1,900 pupils in 25 schools and incorporates four languages.
Watt said children in first grade use their own language for 80 per cent of classes with the rest undertaken in Khmer, but the proportion of minority language used drops over the following two years and, by the time fourth grade begins, all instruction is in Khmer.
"People with a language-development bent would say this isn't a classic language maintenance model, let alone a language development model," Watt said, "but it is much, much better than nothing."
It is too early to say whether efforts such as Care's as well as adult literacy classes in minority languages run by other non-governmental organizations would succeed. But S'aoch is certainly finished, and when it slips away in the next decade, the chances are that only Filippi and a few others would even notice.
Many - perhaps most - of the other 18 endangered Cambodian languages are also doomed. With their extinction will go unique customs and cultures stretching back into Cambodia's pre-history.
DPA
Phnom Penh - The world's rich array of languages is shrinking, UNESCO said, with one language becoming extinct every two weeks. By the end of the century, the UN's cultural body said it expected today's 6,700 languages to be halved. With them will go untold cultural diversity. It is a bleak tale and seemingly unstoppable although not every endangered language is on UNESCO's list. One called Na'vi even has its own listing on Wikipedia, where its 23-page entry covers pronunciation and grammar to frustrate the most talented linguist.
But Na'vi, whose name will be familiar to many moviegoers, is a fiction: It was invented for James Cameron's blockbuster movie Avatar, and even the US language professor who created Na'vi cannot speak it fluently. Technically, that makes Na'vi extinct, although its inventor has high hopes it would catch on.
At the other end of the spectrum is S'aoch, an ethnic minority language spoken in southern Cambodia that experts said predates Na'vi by 6,000 years. S'aoch is at least a working language with 10 fluent speakers.
But there is no Wikipedia page for S'aoch, which is on the verge of extinction. Given that there are people who speak Klingon, a language invented for the Star Trek films, and that Avatar is now the second-highest-grossing movie in history, there is a good chance Na'vi would be spoken long after S'aoch is gone.
Jean-Michel Filippi, a linguistics professor based in Cambodia, is S'aoch's most passionate supporter, having studied the language for 10 years and transcribed more than 4,000 words, which incidentally is four times the vocabulary of the Na'vi language.
He is the first to admit S'aoch has no chance. The village of Samrong Loeu, where the last speakers live, has 110 inhabitants. Just 10 are fluent, but none uses the language. Filippi stressed the lack of speakers is not solely to blame.
"Survival depends on one thing: Does the minority want to protect and save its own culture?" he said.
In the case of S'aoch, the answer is that they do not. After the fall of the Khmer Rouge in 1979, the S'aoch-speaking people were unable to return to their original village, so they ended up in Samrong Loeu with no land and are consequently poor. They see around them Khmer-speaking people with land and relative wealth and, not surprisingly, aspire to be like them.
"When you are put in a position of economic inferiority, you tend to reject your own culture," Filippi said.
S'aoch is an ancient tongue and is related to minority tongues in India and Malaysia as well as to modern Khmer. It predates the famous temples of Angkor Wat in the country's west and is also one of 19 Cambodian languages UNESCO said are at risk of extinction.
Filippi explained why the number of speakers matters less to a language's survival than one might think. Another endangered language, Somray, which is spoken by a few hundred people in western Cambodia, stands a much better chance because the villagers need the language for prayers used in their animist religious services.
"If the prayers are pronounced badly, then they won't work, so they want their children to learn the language," he said.
Blaise Kilian, UNESCO's joint programme coordinator in Phnom Penh, said an array of factors conspire to kill languages, the most obvious being too few people fluent in the tongue.
"You also have the environment and the way people themselves, especially the new generation, react to the changing environment and how much they are interested in preserving and transmitting their own language," Kilian said.
The imminent demise of S'aoch raises the question of what can be done about Cambodia's other endangered languages. Kilian said the outlook is bleak for many.
In the case of S'aoch, the only option is to do what Filippi is doing: write down and record as much of the language as possible while its remaining speakers are alive.
Some of Cambodia's languages are more widely spoken, and steps such as broadcasting radio programmes in minority languages do help - something UNESCO and the government do in the north-eastern provinces of Ratanakkiri and Mondolkiri.
Bilingual education in schools is also important, which is what the international charity Care has done in Cambodia's north-east in conjunction with the Education Ministry. Ron Watt, Care's education adviser, said the 7-year-old programme covers almost 1,900 pupils in 25 schools and incorporates four languages.
Watt said children in first grade use their own language for 80 per cent of classes with the rest undertaken in Khmer, but the proportion of minority language used drops over the following two years and, by the time fourth grade begins, all instruction is in Khmer.
"People with a language-development bent would say this isn't a classic language maintenance model, let alone a language development model," Watt said, "but it is much, much better than nothing."
It is too early to say whether efforts such as Care's as well as adult literacy classes in minority languages run by other non-governmental organizations would succeed. But S'aoch is certainly finished, and when it slips away in the next decade, the chances are that only Filippi and a few others would even notice.
Many - perhaps most - of the other 18 endangered Cambodian languages are also doomed. With their extinction will go unique customs and cultures stretching back into Cambodia's pre-history.
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