Business owners from Nepal, India and Bangladesh are facing crisis as strict new visa regulations threaten their livelihoods and residencies
AFP, Tokyo
In a tiny Tokyo restaurant filled with the smell of Nepalese dumplings, Budhathoki Samjhana surveys the business she built from scratch but may now have to give up as Japan tightens visa rules.Even though Japan has a rapidly aging population and is suffering labor shortages in many sectors, opposition to immigration is growing and new rules for business manager visas were introduced by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party late last year.Nepalese national Budhathoki, who spent a decade away from her young daughter to create a new life for them in Tokyo, faces expulsion from the country because she may not be able to meet the specifications.
Budhathoki Samjhana, a restaurant owner and business manager visa holder at Chitwan Rhino Restaurant and Bar, on June 12 looks on inside her bar in the Okubo–Shin area, one stop north of Shinjuku, in Tokyo.
“I always wanted to become a bridge between Japan and Nepal... but my dream is broken,” the 38-year-old said, in the capital’s Okubo district, where her restaurant is nestled alongside Vietnamese cafes, Indian curry houses and Korean barbecue joints.The stricter rules come as some residents complain of over tourism and soaring land prices in part due to foreign investment, prompting a push by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi for tighter regulations on foreign nationals.
