March 10, 2020

The Japanese Communist Party Hokkaido Prefectural Committee and the JCP Sapporo City Assembly Members’ Group on March 9 published a statement calling for the city government to give up on its plan to bid for the 2030 Winter Olympics and instead work to improve Sapporo citizens’ livelihoods.

In the statement, the JCP, as one of major reasons for its opposition to the city’s move, poineds out that the city government is moving forward towards bidding for the Winter Olympics without making efforts to obtain citizens’ support.

The JCP pointed out that the percentage of people in favor of the city’s bid and against is almost equal in local media’s recent opinion polls

As another reason, the JCP noted that hosting the Olympics costs too much and that the city government intends to promote large-scale development projects under the pretext of hosting the Olympics.

The JCP pointed out that since 1960, every Olympics has run over budget. The total cost for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics ballooned to three trillion yen from the initial budget of 734 billion yen.

Furthermore, the JCP criticized the Sapporo City government for pushing forward with large-scale development projects as infrastructure facilities for the 2030 Winter Games, which include the construction of new roads (12 billion yen) and a bullet train line (35 billion yen).

The JCP stressed that what the city government should do now is to enhance policies that seek to enrich Sapporo citizens’ livelihoods and not to focus on local development excessively dependent on mega development projects and sporting events. The party also said that in response to citizens’ demands, the city government should work to provide an environment where people can enjoy sports easily and at reasonable cost.