Algeria turns to Chinese knowhow

Algeria turns to Chinese knowhow

By Eileen Byrne in Algiers

Published: March 11 2009 02:00 | Last updated: March 11 2009 02:00

Four Chinese telecoms engineers - three men and a woman - sip orange juice in a café on an Algiers square, opposite a statue of Emir Abdelkader, the 19th-century nationalist leader.

Three are children of farmers back in China, but the most senior, 25-year-old Yuan Hua, is son of an engineer. Slightly homesick, they say the locals are welcoming but they wish public transport was more user-friendly for visitors with little Arabic or French.

Employed by Shenzhen-based Huawei Technologies, they are developing mobile phone networks both for the former state monopoly, Algerie Telecom, and its private-sector rival, Djezzy, owned by Egypt's Orascom. They are glad for the work, even if expatriate salaries are not as good as they once were.

As China seeks to expand its presence in Africa, it is looking north to Algeria, with which it has historic ties of friendship. China was the first non-Arab country to recognise Algeria's nationalist government in exile in the late 1950s. There are now about 30,000 Chinese nationals living in the north African country, according to the embassy in Algiers.

The bulk are employed by Chinese engineering, construction and other infrastructure companies, mainly state-owned. Their client is more often than not the Algerian state. President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who at 72 still enjoys the backing of the military elite, is seeking re-election for a third term on April 9.

He has been in a hurry to use the proceeds from oil and gas exports to modernise the country's infrastructure, aiming to spend about $200bn (€157bn, £144bn) on such projects by the end of 2009, and has turned to Chineseknowhow to get things done fast.

"In certain fields, Algeria very much resembles China in the 1980s and 1990s," when infrastructure had to be modernised to attract foreign investors, explains Jinhui Peng, China's commercial attaché in Algiers. "They are following almost the same route to development."

The largest infrastructure contract, a $5.67bn deal to build a 525km stretch of a east-west highway, went to a joint venture between China's state-owned CITIC Group and CRCC, formerly part of Chinese state railways. An impressive new foreign ministry in Algiers is being built by China State Construction Engineering Corporation, which houses its imported workers in a cavernous dormitory building just across the road.

Algerian officials believe that, with its strong foreign reserves, the country can maintain the pace of development even if oil falls as low as $20 a barrel.

Projects include water supply works, airport terminals, university facilities and upgrades to the power infrastructure, with a strong emphasis on housing.

Close to the main square in Oran, the second city, families live in squalor in decrepit blocks of flats dating from before independence in 1962. The shanty-town population was swelled by violence between Islamist groups and the army in the 1990s, which sent villagers scrambling for safety in the towns. Now, however, Oran is ringed by new tower blocks and university buildings, many Chinese built.

As the oil price rose, Algeria was a rich source of jobs for construction workers from China, along with engineers, managers, interpreters - even canteen cooks.

The main opposition parties are boycotting next month's poll, claiming that it will be far from an exercise in democracy. But it can do Mr Bouteflika no harm to point to the progress under his period in office, even as a rump of Islamist fighters continue to hold out in the hills. Many Algerians, battered by the vicious violence of the 1990s, appreciate better housing, water and electricity supplies and college places for their children.

However, the press has noted the paradox of importing Chinese workers when unemployment remains high. Officials from both countries emphasise the numbers of locals employed and training opportunities offered, but a local skills shortage remains.

In Oran, 30-year-old Khalid's complaint is typical: "They pay the Chinese well, and us nothing. If they paid us like they pay them, we would work better." He and his friendswork in odd jobs in the informal economy, as they dream of emigration.

The pay differential is confirmed at a building site operated by Zhongding International Engineering Company, which completed a $53m upgrade to Oran's sewerage system in November.

Algerian workers lack skills, a ZIEC employee says on condition of anonymity. And besides, he adds, wage expectations in China are higher. ZIEC employs a few Algerian welders, steel drivers or carpenters at 680 dinars (£6.60) a day.

Its Chinese blue-collar workers, housed in sparse breeze-block rooms, are better paid but have no holidays during their two-year contract, just "one or two" days off a month, he says.

As for direct investment, Chinese companies have, along with other foreign companies, been given pause by recent tax changes and a ban since last summer on holding majority stakes in Algerian companies.

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Saudi moves to limit off-plan property

By Abeer Allam

Published: March 10 2009 14:37 | Last updated: March 10 2009 14:37

As part of a drive to curb real estate speculation, Saudi Arabia has banned the marketing and presale of building projects which are still in the planning stage except with the approval of a newly-formed government committee.

Although Saudi Arabia is the largest real estate market in the Middle East, bankers and real estate brokers report significant property shortages. They attribute this to rampant speculation linked to sales of plots of land and units during the pre-construction phase as well as growing demand from a young population.

Such speculation has fuelled rising rents and property values, some of which exploded by up to 30 per cent in 2008.

The decision is one of several moves announced earlier this week to reorganise the real estate market. In addition the Saudi cabinet also introduced restrictions on the advertising and marketing of property both inside and outside the kingdom, while a new committee will review real estate development applications, developers’ credentials, and pilot a construction code.

Saudi Arabia has one eye on the collapsing real estate in Dubai, where offplan developments have fuelled property speculation.

The kingdom needs to build at least 1.5m housing units in the next five years, according to analysts.

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Chevron seeks new Mid-East reserves

By Ed Crooks in London

Published: March 8 2009 19:14 | Last updated: March 8 2009 19:14

Chevron, the second-biggest US oil company, will in the next few months begin large-scale testing of a production technique that could unlock tens of billions of barrels of reserves across the Middle East.

The technique, for producing heavy oil that cannot be extracted using conventional methods, will be used in the partitioned neutral zone between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

Chevron’s plans follow its success in extending its licence from the Saudi government to operate in the neutral zone for a further 30 years.

Foreign companies are not generally allowed any share in Saudi Arabia’s oil production, which is dominated by Saudi Aramco, the national oil company.

The exception is the kingdom’s half share in production from the neutral zone, where Chevron’s predecessors have operated for the Saudi government since 1949.

In 2000, Saudi Arabia ejected a Japanese group that had held the licence for offshore production in the zone, and there had been suggestions that the kingdom might also drop Chevron.

The Saudi government was advised in the negotiations by HSBC.

The deal was very important to Chevron, retaining its foothold in an area where other international oil companies would love to operate but generally cannot, and securing more than 4 per cent of its global production.

The company did not disclose the signing fee it paid to Saudi Arabia, but it was significant enough to be mentioned by the company as a “one-time payment” included in its $22.8bn capital spending budget for this year.

Chevron revealed last month in its annual filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission that the neutral zone deal had contributed “the majority” of a 384m barrel increase to the proved oil reserves of the consolidated group.

Without that contribution, additions to its proved oil reserves last year would have fallen well behind the consolidated group’s production of 520m barrels.

Chevron, which makes its annual strategy presentation to analysts on Tuesday, now hopes to add much more than that in reserves of heavy oil that it has not previously been able to extract.

The additional oil accessible in this way could run into the billions of barrels in the neutral zone alone, and there are potentially much larger reserves in both Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

However, there are still technological challenges to be overcome.

Chevron is experienced in producing heavy oil in California and Indonesia using “steamflooding”: injecting steam into the reservoir to warm the oil until it reaches a syrupy consistency and can be pumped out.

Those fields are sandstone, however, while the fields in the neutral zone, like most of the fields in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, are of carbonate rock such as limestone. Steamflooding has never been used in carbonate fields, because the steam would dissolve minerals in the rock, clogging up the reservoir and the wells.

In the large-scale pilot that Chevron plans to launch in the summer, following a small-scale test that concluded last year, it will use steamflooding in the Wafra field in the neutral zone to see if those problems can be overcome.

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Power struggle hits Kuwaiti oil sector

By Jamie Etheridge

Published: March 9 2009 15:49 | Last updated: March 9 2009 15:49

Last December the Kuwaiti government cancelled KDOW, a $17.5bn joint venture between Petroleum Industries Corporation and US-based Dow Chemical. Cancellation of the project, which had previously been approved by Kuwait’s Supreme Petroleum Council, has rattled foreign investors and Kuwait’s petroleum industry officials.

But KDOW is not the only large scheme in trouble. The $18bn so-called Clean Fuels project, which is intended to modernise or upgrade Kuwait’s three refineries – Mina Al-Ahmedi (466,000 barrels per day), Mina Abdullah (270,500 bpd) and Shuaiba (200,000 bpd) – is also making little progress.

The refineries are decades old and have suffered a series of fires. Shuaiba is Kuwait’s youngest refinery. It was commissioned in 1968 and was due to be closed by 2010, but that is likely to be delayed. Last year there were at least two fires each at Mina Abdullah and Shuaiba.

Elsewhere, plans to build a 615,000 bpd fourth oil refinery on the Kuwait-Saudi border have suffered repeated delays – and may now be shelved permanently. A retendering of the project saw costs double from $6.6bn to nearly $15bn – with contractors arguing that initial costs estimates were too low.

A 2008 parliamentary inquiry into alleged irregularities regarding the tender process led to the project being sent to the country’s chief auditing bureau for review. This year, the Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) extended the deadline for pipeline contracts for the proposed refinery another month from February 10 to March 10, stoking fears of unending delays.

The reason for the paralysis is that Kuwait’s hydrocarbon sector is no longer the sole territory of energy technocrats, say analysts. Projects have become political weapons in a long-running stand-off between parliament and government. Critical upgrades and expansion plans are being shelved or completed piecemeal so as not to attract attention.

“The uncertainty around the tendering for the fourth refinery makes the implementation of any further projects challenging. What is the [likely] impact on the pricing of tenders if contractors consider the risk of parliamentary involvement and subsequent delays?” asks Alan Gelder of Wood Mackenzie, the UK energy consultants.

The power struggle centres on control over the country’s vast oil wealth. Home to 8 per cent of the world’s proven oil reserves, Kuwait’s crude oil accounts for 90-95 per cent of its export earnings, bringing in an estimated $66.2bn in the first 10 months of the 2008-09 fiscal year. How those earnings are spent and who oversees that spending are the main points of contention.

Kuwait’s parliament has been dissolved twice and two general elections held within the last three years, both times because of clashes with the government. The cabinet has been formed and resigned four times since February 2006. As the political drama plays out, Kuwait’s energy infrastructure continues to decline.

“It is evident that there is considerable uncertainty for upstream and refining projects in Kuwait. This uncertainty means that the developments will take longer to implement than originally planned,” Mr Gelder warns.

Kuwaiti crude may also lose global market share. The emirate sends more than 60 per cent of its 2.6m bpd in crude exports to China, India and other Asian countries, as well as much of its refined products.

“If we don’t do what we need to do with the products upgrade or the Clean Fuels project, then in five years time it will really hurt the marketability of Kuwait’s [refined] products in the global market,” says Hisham el-Rifaai, head of Project Kuwait at KOC.

Analysts agree. Mr Gelder says: “Kuwait will continue to export its surplus production. It’s likely to find it more difficult to place material in India and China because the domestic projects in these countries will reduce their import requirements. In the longer term, if Kuwait doesn’t improve the quality of its products, ultimately it may not have access to those markets.”

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Thaw spurs prospect of arms sales to Libya

By Heba Saleh in Tripoli

Published: March 10 2009 20:52 | Last updated: March 10 2009 20:52

Newly rehabilitated from its pariah status, Libya is establishing military ties with the US that could lead to the sale of lethal weapons to the north African country.

In a remarkable sign of the degree of rapprochement after four decades of open hostility during which the US carried out military strikes against the regime of Muammer Gaddafi, Gene Cretz, the US ambassador to Tripoli, told the Financial Times that the new military relationship would begin with training programmes, followed by the sale of non-lethal weaponry.

Then “at some point, if both sides want it . . . we would hope that [the sale of lethal weapons] would be a culmination of our military relationship”, he said.

Mr Cretz, who has been in Libya for two months, is the first US ambassador to the country for 36 years. Relations between Washington and Tripoli started improving in 2003 after Colonel Gaddafi, Libya’s leader, renounced a programme to acquire weapons of mass destruction.

But full normalisation of relations had to wait until Tripoli had paid into a mechanism for compensating victims of attacks blamed on its intelligence services, including the downing of a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie in Scotland in 1988.

Libya was for many years a firm fixture on the US list of countries supporting terrorism, but now Mr Cretz describes anti-terrorism co-operation with Tripoli as “one of the positive sides of the relationship”.

Both countries have an interest in combating al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, the militant group based in Algeria which has been forming links with armed Islamists across the Sahara from Libya to Mauritania.

Mr Cretz describes Moussa Koussa, the long-serving chief of Libyan intelligence who was appointed foreign minister last week, as a “well-versed versatile individual” whose appointment “was a very good choice”.

“He knows the intelligence field well, he knows the diplomatic field well. He has dealt with our diplomats, so I think he’s an impressive man and we’ll look forward to working with him.”

In recent years, Mr Koussa has played an important role in improving his country’s relations with Europe and the US. But not long ago, in the decades when Libya was considered an international troublemaker, he was seen as a main figure in the confrontation with the west.

Most of the pressure for the improvement of ties has come from US businesses eager to re-enter the lucrative Libyan market, which has become the preserve of European companies. Not only is Libya one of the most attractive areas in the world for oil and gas production, but it has huge infrastructure needs and the money to pay for them.

In spite of some reforms in recent years, businesses say it remains a tricky place to work, with an inept bureaucracy and an often opaque and arbitrary system. But the rewards are thought by many to justify braving the tough environment.

“What’s interesting about the American commercial interest here is it goes beyond the hydrocarbons sector,” said Mr Cretz. “You name it, they want to come in here. So we are working to bring as many companies here as possible to see what the opportunities are.”

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Kremlin-backed group behind Estonia cyber blitz

By Charles Clover in Moscow

Published: March 11 2009 02:00 | Last updated: March 11 2009 02:00

Members of a Kremlin-backed youth movement have claimed responsibility for May 2007 cyber attacks that crippled Estonia's internet in the midst of a diplomatic argument with Russia.

It is believed to have been the first attack of its kind, directed against virtually the entire informational infra-structure of a Nato country.

Estonian officials said the attacks originated in Russia. They began after April 27, when Estonia removed a second world war Soviet memorial from its capital, Tallinn, provoking a storm of protest from Moscow. They continued to mid May.

Russia has consistently denied any involvement. Yesterday, however, Konstantin Goloskokov, a "commissar" in the youth group Nashe, which works for the Kremlin, told the Financial Times that he and some associates had launched the attack, which appears to be the first time anyone has claimed responsibility.

"I wouldn't have called it a cyber attack; it was cyber defence," he said.

"We taught the Estonian regime the lesson that if they act illegally, we will respond in an adequate way."

The attack, according to computer experts, was a distributed denial-of-service, or DDoS, attack, which is when hundreds or thousands of "zombie" computers are enlisted to overwhelm the target network.

"We were attacked by 178 countries," quipped Katrin Pargmae, a spokeswoman for the Estonian Informatics Centre, which administer's the state's information systems, including the internet.

Internet security experts said that the attacks on Estonia were actually tiny compared with the largest recorded attacks.

Jose Nazario of Arbor Networks, an internet security company, is an expert on the Estonian attacks and said they measured about 100MB per second of traffic, compared with the largest recorded attacks of 40GB per second.

He said that generating such an attack was quite simple, requiring "just a lot of people getting together and running the same tools on their home computers".

Mr Goloskokov said: "We did not do anything illegal. We just visited the various internet sites, over and over, and they stopped working.

"We didn't block them: they were blocked by themselves because of their own technical limitations in handling the traffic they encountered."

He denied that he and his associates were acting on the orders of the Russian government. "We did everything based on our own initiative," he said.

Nashe is a privately financed youth movement and the brainchild of the Kremlin's chief ideologist Vladislav Surkov.

Sergei Markov, a parliamentarian and Mr Goloskokov's boss, volunteered the information that one of his assistants had planned and implemented the attack at a conference earlier this month.

"As far as I know this is the first time anyone has claimed responsibility," said Ms Pargmae, who added that the matter was being handled by the Estonian police. Mr Nazario said that Nato had created a cyber defence centre in Estonia last year.

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Safra clients were offered compensation

By Jonathan Wheatley in São Paulo

Published: March 11 2009 02:00 | Last updated: March 11 2009 02:00

Clients of the Safra Group have been offered compensation for money they lost in the alleged $50bn Ponzi scheme run by Bernard Madoff Investment Securities.

The Safra Group, which includes one of Brazil's biggest banks and substantial private banking operations in the US and Europe, has denied marketing any Madoff funds and says it only put money into funds investing in Bernard Madoff Investment Securities if requested by its international clients outside Brazil.

But investors and their lawyers have told the Financial Times that Safra representatives from the US and Europe actively marketed a fund called Zeus Partners Limited to clients in Brazil and elsewhere in Latin America.

The Zeus fund is a British Virgin Islands company controlled by SIAM Capital Management of Bermuda. Its custodian is Banque Jacob Safra (Gibraltar) Limited, part of the Safra Group.

People familiar with the situation said Safra representatives from the US and Europe had been in Latin America for at least the past three weeks making verbal offers to investors in the Zeus fund. They said the representatives were offering clients the value of their initial investment in perpetual bonds paying interest of 2 per cent a year, and the offer was therefore worth about 30 per cent of the value of initial investments.

A lawyer representing a number of Zeus investors said they were "not happy, to put it mildly". Banco Safra in São Paulo made no comment yesterday.

The Safra offer appears similar to an offer made by Santander of Spain to its customers who invested in Madoff funds, also involving perpetual securities paying interest of 2 per cent a year. However, Zeus investors said the Safra offer was being made verbally, so the precise details of the offer were hard to evaluate.

Banks and investment managers are coming under pressure to compensate clients who lost money to Mr Madoff's alleged fraud. The National Bank of Kuwait has returned $50m to investors and Celfin Capital, a bank in Chile, is returning about $11m to about 100 clients - the total value of their initial investments.

The Safra Group sold a number of Madoff "feeder" funds, such as Fairfield Sentry and Kingate Global, which clearly stated they would allocate assets to Bernard Madoff Investment Securities. While the description of the Zeus fund bears several of the hallmarks of Madoff funds, including the now-notorious "split-strike conversion" strategy supposedly employed by Mr Madoff, it makes no mention of Mr Madoff or his company.

Lawyers said many investors only found out Zeus was investing in Madoff funds after Mr Madoff's arrest in December.

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日医理事、レセプトのオンライン請求義務化撤回求める

　日本医師会の中川俊男常任理事は11日の記者会見で、政府が2011年度の完全義務化を決定しているレセプト（診療報酬明細書）のオンライン請求の完全義務化を撤回するよう求めた。「地域医療の崩壊はグローバル資本主義の結果だ。その流れにオンライン請求の完全義務化はある」と指摘。「利点は保険者に集中し、医療機関の費用負担を考えるとデメリットばかりだ」と強調した。(21:01)

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ヘッジファンド監督・規制、Ｇ20会議で合意へ

　財務省幹部は10日、13日から開く20カ国・地域（Ｇ20）財務相・中央銀行総裁会議で、これまで金融監督の対象外だったヘッジファンドなどの規制強化が議題になるとの見方を示した。「金融システムを守る上で重要な機関には規制をかける必要があるとの一般的な姿勢を示すことになるだろう」と指摘。ヘッジファンドも金融監督・規制の対象に含めることで参加国が大筋合意できるとの見通しを示した。

　財務省幹部は(1)マクロ経済への対応策(2)金融規制・監督の改革(3)国際通貨基金（ＩＭＦ）や国際金融開発機関の役割強化――が主要議題となると説明。マクロ経済対策では「成長や雇用を維持するため各国があらゆる手段をとる必要がある」との認識で合意する一方、中期的な財政規律をどう確保するかが論点になると指摘した。(07:00)

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チッソ・三菱化学など３社、肥料事業統合で合意

　チッソと旭化成ケミカルズ、三菱化学は11日、それぞれの出資する2社が手掛ける肥料事業を統合することで基本合意したと発表した。国内の肥料需要は減少傾向で、原価上昇などで採算も悪化しているため、統合により事業を効率化する。今後、統合の方法や出資比率などの詳細を詰め、10月の統合を目指すとしている。

　チッソグループが65％、旭化成ケミカルズが35％を出資するチッソ旭肥料（東京・文京）と、三菱化学子会社の三菱化学アグリ（東京・千代田）の肥料事業を統合する。チッソ旭肥料の年間売上高は200億円で、三菱化学アグリは236億円。(19:01)

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日本体育協会：０９年度予算６２億円、前年度比１２億円増

　日本体育協会は１１日に開いた理事会で、総額６２億６０００万円の０９年度予算案を承認した。２５日の評議員会に提案される。前年度比約１２億１５００万円増。ｔｏｔｏの売り上げが好調なことを背景に、「スポーツ振興くじ助成金収入」が９億５８００万円増え、予算規模全体を押し上げている。

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非正規雇用：結婚・出産は「正規」の半分　２０～３０代

　厚生労働省が１１日公表した「成年縦断調査結果」で、非正規雇用の２０～３０代の独身男性が０２～０７年の５年間で結婚した割合は、正規雇用と比べ半分にとどまることが分かった。女性も非正規だと子供を産んだ割合が正規のほぼ半分で、不安定な雇用形態が非婚化や少子化の一因となっている実態が浮かぶ。

　調査は０２年１０月時点で２０～３４歳の男女に毎年質問票を送り、６回目の今回は継続的に回答がある約１万６０００人分を集計した。調査日は０７年１１月。

　０２年調査では独身だった男性が、その後５年以内に結婚した割合は２２％。正規雇用の人は２４％だったが、非正規だと１２％、無職だと９％に下がる。年間所得別では１００万円未満（８％）と４００万～５００万円（２１％）で約２．５倍の開きがあった。

　女性は仕事の有無や正規と非正規の違いで結婚した割合に大きな差はなかったが、５年間で夫婦が子供をもうけた割合は、妻が正規雇用だと４３％、無職４８％なのに対し、非正規は２２％と低かった。出産後に元の職場に戻った割合も、正規は６７％、非正規は２３％と大きな差があった。

　厚労省統計情報部は「非正規雇用は正規より給与が低く、育児休業を取りにくいことが、結婚や出産の判断に影響しているのではないか」と分析している。

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メルパルク：ゆうちょ財団からワタベに無償譲渡

　日本郵政の婚礼・宿泊施設「メルパルク」の運営事業が、日本郵政のファミリー企業「ゆうちょ財団」から総合ブライダル大手「ワタベウェディング」に無償譲渡されていたことが１１日分かった。鳩山邦夫総務相は、譲渡の経緯について調査を検討する考えを示した。

　同日の参院予算委員会で、民主党の尾立源幸氏が明かした。尾立氏は、無償譲渡は「約２億６０００万円の債務超過を考慮しても安すぎる」と指摘。鳩山総務相は「メルパルクは知名度があり、業績も好調だ。（日本郵政は）あらゆる資料を公表すべきだ」と答えた。

　メルパルクは郵便貯金の宣伝施設として都心部に建設され、現在、東京、大阪や京都など全国１１カ所にある。日本郵政は建物を所有し、運営はゆうちょ財団に委託。０８年３月期は全施設が黒字で、０７年１０月からの１年間に財団から約２４億円の納付金を得た。

　日本郵政は０８年６月、メルパルクを０８年１０月からワタベに一括賃貸することを決定。初年度の賃料は約３０億円で、ゆうちょ財団も０８年７月、従業員約１０００人を継続雇用する条件で、ワタベへの事業譲渡を決めた。

　日本郵政法は、かんぽの宿とともに１２年９月末までにメルパルクを譲渡または廃止することを定めている。日本郵政は「ワタベからの賃料収入を見込める上、所有し続けるので今後、高く売却できる可能性がある。譲渡に問題はない」と説明している。

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アフガンでの秘密作戦停止　米紙報道
2009.3.11 00:35

　１０日付の米紙ニューヨーク・タイムズは、アフガニスタンで反政府武装勢力タリバン掃討作戦を展開している米軍の秘密作戦部門を率いる司令官が先月、戦闘で民間人の犠牲者が増加している懸念があり、アフガンでのほとんどの秘密作戦を停止する命令を出していたと報じた。

　命令は戦闘で女性や子供が巻き込まれる例が相次いだためで、停止は既に約２週間に及ぶという。しかしタリバンや国際テロ組織アルカイダの最高指導者に関する作戦は除外されているという。

　国連アフガニスタン支援団は先月、同国で２００８年にテロや戦闘に巻き込まれた民間人の死者数が０７年に比べて約４０％増えたとの報告書を発表した。

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どうするお寺の普請（上）　重い費用負担

2009年3月11日

　寺の施設改修などの普請は、檀家（だんか）が寄付で支えてきた。だが少子高齢化で、檀家数は減る一方だ。普請費用工面に苦悩するケースも多い。費用負担は、どうすればいいのか。　（飯田克志）

　「昨年十二月、寺の修復工事への寄付を要請する手紙が届いた。定年になり年金生活で、そんな余裕はない」

　静岡県内の寺の檀家で、首都圏在住の六十代の男性が悩みをこう打ち明けた。送られてきたのは住職名の趣意書、総代会、世話人などの役員の「御寄付の御願い」、工事見積書、建築専門家の調査書だった。

　百五十年ほど経過した本堂のほか、庫裏、山門の屋根などが老朽化し、修理が不可欠と調査で判明した経緯などが書かれていた。事業費約一億三千万円の見込み。分割も認め一軒当たり三十万円以上を、二〇一一年三月末までに寄付することを要請していた。

　浜松市の七十代女性も昨年、寺から庫裏の改修と研修室の新設費用として、五十万の寄付依頼があった。事業費は約八千万円。

　年金生活の女性は「一般住宅ならここでは三軒建つ金額。檀家の幹部と話し合って決めたそうだけど、一般の檀家には決まったことが突然降りてきた」と戸惑いを隠さない。結局、十年の分割払いにした。

　寺の運営費は、法事などの布施が大半を占め、本山からの支援はない独立採算制だ。そのため、寺の建て直しなど大規模な事業費は、檀家の寄付が頼りだった。江戸時代に檀家制度が始まって以降、明治時代に法的拘束力がなくなっても、檀家が支える関係は変わらない。

　だが、少子化で檀家に跡継ぎがなかったり、いても遠隔地に住んでいると寺との関係は疎遠になりがちだ。檀家の高齢化も進み、年金生活者が少なくない。寄付は大きな負担になる。寺側もその事情は分かっていて、寄付要請も簡単には決断できない。

　「一昨年十二月から総代会議で相談を始め、地区の世話人、青年部、婦人部の代表にも加わってもらい、改修を決めた」

　前出の男性の菩提（ぼだい）寺の男性住職（５３）はこう経緯を説明した。法事などで会った檀家にも個々に説明し、昨年八月には檀家が多く集まる盆の行事の際に正式に報告、了承を得たという。その後に約四百五十軒の檀家に寄付依頼の手紙を送付、檀家の理解を求めることに苦心している。

　過去二十年の改修などは、寺が負担してきた。住職は「今回は高額で寺だけでは無理。ほっておけば建て替えが必要になって、子孫の負担が増える」と事情を話す。

　総代の男性も「三十万円以上でなければいけないことはない。お寺さんの敷居が高いと思う方は、総代でも相談を受けたい」と気を使う。

　臨床仏教研究所（東京都）が二月に実施した調査（全国の四十－六十九歳、五百六十六人が対象）では、「将来、寺への布施が負担になる」と考えている人が「そう思う」「まあそう思う」を合わせ７０・３％いた。費用負担は檀家に重くのしかかる。

　調査を担当した第一生命経済研究所の小谷みどり主任研究員は「檀家離れがさらに進むことを示唆している」と指摘する。

　前出の住職は「どう一緒に手を結んで歩いていけるか、大きな課題」と話す。費用負担をどうするのか、解決策を模索する取り組みがある。

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内部告発者の実名を会社側に通知、弁護士を戒告処分

　内部告発者の実名を会社側に伝えたのは、秘密保持義務に反し、弁護士の品位を失う非行にあたるとして、第２東京弁護士会が、トヨタ自動車販売店グループの外部通報窓口担当の男性弁護士（３５）を、戒告の懲戒処分にした。

　２００６年に摘発された大阪トヨタ自動車の架空販売・車庫飛ばし事件で、社内の不正を告発した４０歳代の男性社員が懲戒請求を申し立てていた。

　公益通報者保護法施行から今年４月で３年になるが、告発者を保護する弁護士が処分されるのは異例。処分は３月３日付。同弁護士会懲戒委員会の議決書などによると、社員は０６年４月５日、同弁護士に電話で不正を告発したところ、翌日、会社から１０日間の自宅待機を命じられた。

　虚偽申告などを排除するため、通報は実名で受け付け、会社側には匿名で通知する仕組みだが、同弁護士は「社員が『もみ消されると困る』と希望した」とし、実名を会社側に伝えた。一方、社員は「希望した事実はない」と否定していた。

　懲戒委員会の審査に先立ち、綱紀委員会は昨年１月、社員が実名通知を承諾した事実は認められないと判断し、弁護士を「懲戒相当」と議決した。

　これに対し、懲戒委員会は、社員が自宅待機を命じられた後、弁護士に抗議をしていない点などを挙げ、「社員は承諾していた」と、綱紀委員会とは逆の判断を示した。

　しかし、承諾に際して弁護士が、実名通知で起こりうる不利益を、社員に具体的に説明していないことなどから、「社員が自発的な意思で、会社に実名を通知して不正を調査するよう求めた承諾とは認められない」と判断、弁護士は「秘密保持義務に違反している」と結論付けた。

　弁護士は読売新聞の取材に「実名通知について社員の承諾を得ていた、との認定をいただいたことは、よかった。今後の対応は代理人と相談して決めたい」とコメント。社員は「実名通知について事実認定が覆ったのは不満だが、弁護士に非があると認められた点は評価している」と話している。

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三洋電機、希望退職者が殺到…想定２倍の９８８人
特集 大揺れ雇用

　三洋電機は１１日、国内の半導体事業のグループ５社で募集した希望退職に、想定の２倍近い９８８人の応募があったと発表した。

　当初は半導体のグループ従業員１万人のうち、国内では５００人程度の応募があると見ていた。６０億円と見込んでいた割り増し退職金は８５億円に膨らむ見通しで、２００９年３月期連結決算の税引き後利益は２年ぶりに赤字になる公算が大きい。

　三洋は半導体事業の不振を受け、２月初旬から下旬に希望退職者を募った。不況で再就職が難しく、応募者は少ないとの見方もあったが、同事業の先行きが不透明なことなどから、応募が想定を上回ったようだ。