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- The
Koseki and Juminhyo
- By: Francoise Sasaki
- The UMJ Volume 3.1 (Juminhyo Special)
- Issues which are not addressed don't die; they don't even fade out, they grow old.
- There is a lot of ignorance and carelessness about this matter among the foreign spouses themselves.
- By: Alessandra Shimizu
- The UMJ Volume 3.1 (Juminhyo Special)
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Legally speaking,there is nothing wrong in discrimination based upon the lack of citizenship but ...... the legal status of foreigners married to Japanese citizens benefits no one. Although we do not suffer actual discrimination in everyday life, are free to work and buy property and insurance,in this day and age when everything has to be "international" we are still legally " married " without being listed as "husband/wife" on our spouse's "koseki." We are not listed at all on our spouse's "juminhyo," although a Japanese national can have the person he/she "intends to marry" listed there if that person is a Japanese citizen. A foreigner may be listed in the remarks column of his/her spouse's juminhyo as the "de facto head of the household" but not as his/her spouse's wife/husband. We are "residents" for all practical (population survey for instance where our listing is compulsory) and fiscal purposes, but we are conspicuously absent from the family "certificate of residency"... It is often argued that we are "properly" listed where we belong, and that the certificate of alien residency serves the same purpose as the juminhyo. This is not true. That document doesn't show us as a member of our family unit. It only shows our relation to the "head of the household," who happens to be our Japanese spouse. No mention is made either of our Japanese children or of our relation to them. It has been going on for decades in such a subtle way that usually people are not even aware of it: it isn't often that one has the opportunity to see a standard "koseki" and realize that there is something "strange" with one's own. The Koseki is the base from which the juminhyo is established. On the Koseki, our spouse is married but ...... doesn't have a wife/husband. On the juminhyo our spouse is forever single and our children mother/fatherless.
I'm a foreigner married to a Japanese and live in Hokkaido. I've been really concerned about this matter for a while and two years ago my husband and I officially asked our Town Hall officers to have my name listed at least in the remark column of the juminhyo (bikoran) as the mayor has the final authority to do so. We actually visited our Town Hall many times in order to pressure them to take up our case. Finally they accepted to present our request at one of the regional meetings to get the permission of listing my name in the remark column of the juminhyo due to the inconvenience (for us) and irregularity as a family for not being listed. The Regional Authorities considered our request very unusual (it was the first time they heard about it), they didn't take it seriously and rejected it due to its inconsistency: the lack of my name doesn't create any inconvenience to the public officers . What they consider is, of course, "their" convenience, not "ours." I had previously tried to get the attention of other foreign wives living in Hokkaido through an association called AFWJ but I realized with disappointment that there is a lot of ignorance and carelessness about this matter among the foreign spouses themselves. If even the foreign wives do not mind not being officially recognized as a whole family, how can we expect the Japanese officials to take us seriously ? |
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