TOKYO: "Firmly oppose arbitrary revision of the Constitution!" "No to war!" "Safeguard the pacifist Constitution!"
On Sunday (May 3), around 50,000 people gathered at Tokyo Rinkai Disaster Prevention Park, chanting slogans and holding banners against the government's push for constitutional revision and military expansion, the largest turnout in recent years.
Sunday marks Japan's Constitution Memorial Day, commemorating the day the country's current Constitution took effect in 1947.
Widely known as the pacifist Constitution, the supreme law's Article 9 renounces war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as a means of settling international disputes.
It also stipulates that Japan will never maintain land, sea, and air forces or other war potential, and that the right of belligerency of the state will not be recognised.
At this year's rally, held as Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi accelerates efforts to revise the Constitution, public unease was more visible than ever.
A participant identified as Kagawa, who attended the rally with his three children, told reporters that he found it hard to accept that Takaichi, who had not made such sweeping security policy changes a central part of her campaign during the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leadership race or the general election, is now pushing the agenda forward at such a rapid pace.
"National security policies are decided by adults, but it is today's children who will have to live with them," Kagawa noted. "The fact that young people and children may be placed in such a tense international environment is something we adults must think about very carefully."
Yoneyama, a mother who attended the rally with her nine-year-old child, told reporters that Japan has adhered to the current Constitution for nearly 80 years, yet the government is now in a rush to revise it.
"Japan has adhered to the current Constitution for nearly 80 years, but now the Takaichi administration seems to be rushing to change it," she claimed. "I can't help but feel a strong sense of concern that they are trying to build a society more prone to waging war."
Masakatsu Adachi, emeritus professor at Japan's Kanto Gakuin University, warned that politicians must place Article 9 at the very core of any discussion on security policy.
"If we don't view the global situation through the lens of Article 9, we could steadily drift back to a prewar state," the professor warned. - Xinhua
