Kawabe dam locals promised support

ITSUKI, Kumamoto Pref. (Kyodo) Land minister Seiji Maehara on Saturday visited the site in Kumamoto Prefecture where the Kawabe River Dam was supposed to be built and told local residents new legislation will be drafted to compensate them for its cancellation.

"We aim to pass a new law to provide compensation," Maehara said at a meeting in the village of Itsuki to exchange opinions on the 43-year-old project.

"This is about the cancellation of dam construction itself. We will continue with other projects related to livelihoods," Maehara said, emphasizing plans to offer financial support to residents affected by the cancellation.

The Democratic Party of Japan took power last month vowing to do away with wasteful public works projects. It specifically targeted the Kawabe River Dam and the Yamba Dam in Naganohara, Gunma Prefecture, as examples of wasteful spending. Maehara visited Naganohara earlier in the week.

In Itsuki, residents handed Maehara a petition demanding that a plan to boost the local economy be put into place as soon as possible.

The Kawabe River Dam project was launched in 1966. The goal was to construct a multipurpose dam that would prevent floods, provide water for agriculture and generate hydroelectric power.

But as the decades went by, demand for power and agricultural water fell substantially, prompting the firms that originally planned to use the dam to exit the project in 2007.

Although the relocation of about 550 households that would have been submerged had the dam been built is almost complete, work on the dam itself hasn't even started yet. The project has been held up by local residents who are concerned the dam will damage the environment and the local fishing industry.

Even so, as of the end of March some ¥210 billion of the ¥265 billion budgeted for the dam had already been spent.