Cause of a girl’s suicide
(From The Japan Times November 11 issue)

小6女児自殺の原因

On Oct. 23, Ms. Akiko Uemura, a sixth-grade girl in Kiryu, Gunma Prefecture, died after hanging herself. On Nov. 8, Kiryu’s board of education made public a report saying she had been psychologically bullied. It denied a cause-and-effect relationship between the bullying and her suicide. But Oct. 25, Mr. Yoichi Kishi, principal of the municipal Niisato Higashi Primary School, said school authorities had known that the girl “was not in good condition as indicated by her isolation at lunch time.” We wonder why the school could not act soon enough to prevent her suicide.

The Uemuras had moved to Kiryu from Aichi Prefecture in 2008. Akiko’s parents say she started complaining about being bullied in the fifth grade. A factor that might have touched off the bullying was the fact that her mother is a Filipina. Classmates bullied her with such words as “You stink” or “Did you take a bath?”

The bullying abated but resumed after Akiko entered the sixth grade and a new homeroom teacher took charge of the class. The Mainichi Shimbun reports that although the father consulted with school authorities more than 10 times over the bullying after she became a sixth grader, they did not take concrete steps to solve the problem.

The board of education’s report says that pupils in the class became so rowdy in the second half of the first semester that the class became uncontrollable. Akiko started to have lunch alone in mid-September and the teacher was aware of this.

In October, Akiko was often absent from school. After one period where she was absent for two days, she attended an out-of-school class Oct. 21. A classmate said, “Why do you come only on this kind of occasion?” She cried and complained to another teacher about the agony of having to take lunch alone. Two days later, she hanged herself with a muffler she had knitted as a present for her mother.

Why does the board of education deny a cause-and-effect relationship between the bullying and her suicide? It appears as if the board and school authorities refused to squarely deal with the tragedy, and their responsibility in the case.

群馬県桐生市の小学6年生、上村明子さんが10月23日、首吊り自殺をした。市教委は11月8日に彼女が精神的苦痛を受けていたと報告、いじめと自殺の因果関係は否定した。しかし校長は、彼女が給食時間に孤立していたなどのよくない状況にあったことを学校側が認識していたと述べていた。なぜ自殺を防げなかったのか。

上村さんは5年生になるといじめを親に告げた。母がフィリピン人であることがいじめの一因だった可能性がある。いったん治まったいじめは6年で担任が新しくなると再開。父親は学校側に10回以上相談したが、具体的な解決策はとられなかったという。別の教員に苦境を訴えた2日後、母に編んだマフラーで首を吊った。

いじめと自殺の因果関係を否定する市教委と学校側は悲劇とその責任に正面から取り組むことを拒否しているようだ。