It’s Sustainability

Main message of the winner was “Tokyo, the number one in the world.” A former Minister of Health, Labor and Welfare, Yoichi Masuzoe, swept all other fifteen candidates in Tokyo metropolitan gubernatorial election voted on Sunday. So, what kind of number one did he mean? Nobody knows. He just yelled number one welfare, number one safety and number one Olympic games, which did not make reasonable sense. Before discussing it, can Tokyo survive crises it has to face in the future?

According to exit polls, voters focused on economy and employment the most, followed by welfare and nuclear energy. Former Chairman of Japan Bar Association, Kenji Utsunomiya, and former Prime Minister, Morihiro Hosokawa, stayed far behind of Masuzoe. Even the sum of votes for Utsunomiya and Hosokawa did not surpass Masuzoe’s, the fact which showed voter’s reluctance in discussing nuclear issue. What was shocking for Hosokawa, who got firm support of former popular Prime Minister, Jun-ichiro Koizumi, was votes for him could not overtake those for Utsunomiya, who shifted his strategy from no-nuclear energy to welfare and other concerned issues.

Masuzoe’s main talking point in his campaign was welfare. Ratio of people in sixty-five years old or more will increase from twenty percent in 2010 to thirty-four percent in 2040. More houses, supporting stations and health care workers will be needed in everywhere in Tokyo. Although Masuzoe promised world number-one-level welfare, it was still not clear that would be enough. He also appealed the number one Olympic in the history in Tokyo, asking people supreme hospitality.

Those are not the points for future of Tokyo. There is an estimate that the likeliness of as big earthquake as magnitude seven is seventy percent in next thirty years. If it happens, not only Tokyo Olympic but also Tokyo itself will fade away. In spite of decades-long argument of disseminating functions of the capital, politics and bureaucracy has been lazy in getting conclusion. It is close to the situation when leaders had been rejecting to prepare for entire power down in nuclear power plant, simply because they did not imagine such a disaster.

To meet demands of voters who wanted to reduce consumption of nuclear power, Masuzoe definitely needs to elaborate how Tokyo can show realistic energy supply, namely a concrete plan for development of renewable energy. Sustainability matters not because that is main concern of voters, but because Tokyo is literally on the verge of perish.