Urgent General Meeting of the Okinawan People's Council for the Promotion of the OIST

An urgent general meeting of the Okinawan People’s Council for the Promotion of the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) took place on May 8, 2009 in Naha in light of the delay in parliamentary enactment of the School Corporation of Okinawa Institute of the Science and Technology Act (hereafter the OIST Act). In the meeting, the members of the Council, chaired by Okinawa Governor Mr. Hirokazu Nakaima, were briefed on the current status of the OIST project by OIST Promotion Corporation Executive Director Dr. Robert Baughman, as well as on the chronology and the current situation surrounding the OIST Act by Mr. Hiroshi Shimoji, Deputy Director General in charge of science and technology at the Department of Planning, the Okinawa Prefectural Government. Dr. Hiroko Sho, a member of the OIST P.C. Board of Governors and a member of the Group of Scientists Supporting the Early Establishment of the OIST, read out an Urgent Appeal for Support of the Opening of the OIST, jointly signed by Nobel Laureates and other renowned scientists around the world. At the end of the meeting, the members unanimously adopted a resolution, the Request for Early Enactment of the OIST Act, to be brought by Governor Nakaima and other senior members of the Council to Okinawa Affairs Minister Tsutomu Sato, as well as to ruling and opposition lawmakers on May 12-13, 2009.