Workers slam TEPCO's shady recruiting process for Fukushima cleanup

They just followed the standard labor practices in Japan so naturally its shady and involves the Yakuza. To raise wages they would have to remove the useless seishin salaryman. As its nuclear, they could use contract labour without all the nonsense middlemen.

The problem is that TEPCO with its poor track record is not coming from a place of strength. Not a leg to stand on. Subcontractors look down on them.

This will not be a good time for them to try to change Japan's entrenched archaic ways of conducting recruitment. They will take whatever they can get, and be forced to smile and bow in gratitude to these companies, despite falling numbers of replacement workers. They are now thousands short at Fukushima, I have heard.

TEPCO aren't responsible for the workers??? Working in an area they ment to be responsible for!. Caused by their past unresponsibility. Who is responsible.....?

From everything I have read and watched about this supposed "clean up" there are about 1000 different people, basically bosses, managers, CEO's, etc that need to do HARD jail time! There have been interviews on BBC from workers. They found that over 30% of workers were not getting their promised hazard pay. The companies were just pocketing in. Then this guys story. You know this is only the tip of the iceburg.

well, who was expecting an honest job posting like this from TEPCO: "Help dismantling the plant at highest radiation levels. Wear an oxygen tank and a double-layer protective suit which still wont fully protect you as the radiation will be so high that it could burn through your annual exposure limit in just under an hour." Just ppl who were about to commit suicide anyways might sign up there

ABE - THERE IS A SITUATION HERE!

For God's sake wake up and get this handled!

How on Earth can you go to Turkey to hawk Japanese nuclear "technology" while this situation is a) so dangerous and b) completely unhandled?

isnt it illegal for government firm ( Tepco ) to use private contractors... ? why it is not regulated by law and only allowed as direct hiring...

Skimming off the top of the workers wages is such a good idea, I have some job openings for labourers and I'll watch from my office while I count the skimmings, any takers, we have many openings.

This whole thing is riddled with scams, schemes, back handers, envelopes full of money, nights out drinking, back slapping, laughing and trips to the bank to get more cash. If you are not in on this you are either stupid, or honest. Wonder which ?

Not a day goes by a Yakuza-related story hits the headlines. I swear they have their fingers in every pie imaginable.

This is disgusting on so so many levels

Shame on tepco, shame on Japan!

The sad thing is that nobody is really surprised about it.

The Fukushima clean up should be the highest paid and highest priority project in Japan, but instead it is scandalous joke! However, it's reassuring to know that TEPCO will post a profit this year thanks to huge donations of public funds and increased electricity tariffs, which effectively means, we paid these mullets twice!!!

The so called Japanese craftsmanship at work here.

This is some shady stuff.

It goes to show how many government agencies TEPCO has paid off to look the other way on anything they do there.

My guess is TEPCO considers every Japanese citizen as expendable as long as it saves them money, remember, the government raised the safe dose level to let everyone know they are now safe from dying from radiation sickness.

And, when the great Olympic gravy train starts in Tokyo there will be even fewer workers heading north.

Not a day goes by a Yakuza-related story hits the headlines. I swear they have their fingers in every pie imaginable.

So that's where all those missing digits end up.

TEPCO is rotten through and through. The whole thing stinks to high heaven. How can the Japanese government sleep at night knowing the health and safety of the whole country, and points beyond, is in the hands of these unscrupulous incompetents? They think nothing of the lives of their people.

Some DPJ Parliamentarians have been commenting (off-the-record) to American businessmen from companies involved in the US Trade Dept mission for 'Fukushima Environmental Remediation' (started in 2012) that the US Government has been storing nuclear weapons grade materials at Fukushima, Daiichi Power Plant, and other locations in Japan for years (so they can keep the records of Tons of highly-enriched materials off the US rolls for Intl Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)). They claimed this was part of the reason that most foreigners (aside from the TEPCO sycophant companies) are not allowed to participate in the Power Plant cleanup operations. If that is true, it explains more about the bumbling efforts to get these places remediated.

Michael if that's true then it's pretty disgusting.

I feel sorry for the workers at that place - what a way to earn a crust.

I'm going to a lecture here in Glasgow next week about Fukushima... should be interesting.

depending on the yakuza to clean up fukushima...japan's gonna get gouged on this and may never even complete the clean up, if this was actually ever achievable

Fukushima workers.... Japan's new Burakumin?

What would happen with direct hires is that as they age, all and any cancer would be attributed directly to TEPCO and they would be on the hook for compensation. However, if they fire through middlemen they are no longer responsible for future health issues. Especially if scumbag middlemen pay them in unmarked cash filled envelopes thus eliminating any aper trails. Imagine going to court 20 years down the road and trying to sue a company that no longer exists with no paper trail to follow??

Clever, in a evil sort of way. But that is how TEPCO roll their pimp game. Always have, always will.

Always will be very sad for a proud people left homeless by greedy countrymen in such a beautiful place

Journalist and commentator Jake Adelstein has been doing award-quality reporting on this issue for some time. Check him out on his Japan Sub-culture Research Center page. Sadly (& unsurprisingly) none of this has been picked up by the Japanese media.

This sort has been reported by JT regularly but no change in attitude has thus far been apparent. This shows no one cares or no one wants or can do anything about it untill we see low wage foreign workers on site.