The Supreme Court on Wednesday overturned a high court ruling and supported the Tokyo Metropolitan Government's decision to bar a civil servant from taking a managerial promotion exam due to her South Korean nationality.</PARAGRAPH> <PHOTO> <TABLE WIDTH='180' ALIGN='right' BORDER='0'> <TR> <TD><IMG ALT='News photo' BORDER='0' SRC='/images/photos2005/nn20050127a1a.jpg' WIDTH='180' HEIGHT='237'/></TD> </TR> <TR> <TD><FONT SIZE='1'><B>Chong Hyang Gyun </B></FONT></TD> </TR> <TABLE> </PHOTO> <PARAGRAPH>The key issue in the top court's 15-justice Grand Bench deliberations was whether there are reasonable grounds under the Constitution to justify the metro government's treatment of Chong Hyang Gyun, a 54-year-old public health nurse, regarding promotion because of her lack of Japanese nationality.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>In her lawsuit, Chong, a second-generation South Korean resident born to a Korean father and Japanese mother, argued that the metro government's stance violates the constitutional principle of equality before the law and freedom to choose one's occupation.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The bench voted 13-2 in determining that the metro government did not violate the Constitution by rejecting her request to take the exam.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The majority of the justices said that some local government-level civil servants are entrusted with tasks that involve the exercise of public authority, and that in doing so their actions greatly affect the lives of residents.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>'Based on the –

principle of national sovereignty and in view of the fact that the people should in the end be responsible for how the central and local governments govern, (the Constitution) should be viewed as presuming that Japanese nationals in principle will assume local civil service positions" that require the exercise of public authority, they stated.

It is the first Supreme Court ruling on promotion discrimination based on nationality.

The decision, handed down by presiding Supreme Court Chief Justice Akira Machida, is likely to affect other local governments' policies on the promotion of employees with foreign nationalities, who still face hurdles due to a government policy requiring Japanese citizenship for civil servants in areas of public authority.

Justice Tokuji Izumi and Justice Shigeo Takii opposed the majority decision, saying the metropolitan government's decision was not rational.