Governor’s Resignation with Gaffe

The Governor of Shizuoka, Heita Kawakatsu, announced his resignation in coming June, explaining his action as taking responsibility for his gaffe in the speech which had been criticized as including discrimination in its expression. Kawakatsu is well known as a firm protestor against building a railway for maglev train in a part of his prefecture. He insisted that the biggest reason for his resignation was official announcement of the national government to postpone the date for starting Linear Chuo Shinkansen (LCS) between Tokyo and Nagoya. 

In his speech to freshmen and freshwomen of the office of Shizuoka prefectural government on April 1st, Kawakatsu encouraged them resembling their job to thinktank. “You are highly intellectual personnel, different from the people who sell vegetables every day, take care of cattle or manufacturing goods,” said Kawakatsu. Soon after that, criticisms against his speech arrived on his office through telephone or email. They are the arguments that it was a discriminative speech against certain types of workers or that he devalued the industry in Shizuoka.

 

Kawakatsu explained next day that he simply had said about the difference of their job, and denied his intention of discrimination. However, he announced his resignation without telling whether it was related to the criticisms against his speech. In the press conference on April 3rd, Kawakatsu explained that he decided to step down, because JR Tokai gave up starting LCS in 2027.

 

JR Tokai announced on March 26th that it would postpone its plan of starting operation of LCS in 2027. The decision was because Shizuoka did not approve the construction of the railway and the plan had been delayed so long. Although JR Tokai expected to finish the construction of the Shizuoka section by 2027, Kawakatsu had been denying the construction, raising concerns on water resource of the Oigawa river, which was supplied to the people and industries in Shizuoka.

 

Linear Chuo Shinkansen has 286 kilometers of length in total. Shizuoka section of the railway is 8.9 kilometers. While other regions were basically approving the construction, Shizuoka had been the only obstruction against LCS. Although Kawakatsu regarded the decision of JR Tokai as his achievement of putting a period on the issue, some people in and outside of Shizuoka expected acceleration of the plan after Kawakatsu leaves the office.

 

Taking responsibility for the people living in the local region, a governor has a power to block any project which brings negative impact on the people’s life. That must have been the cause of Kawakatsu’s protest against the national government. However, the resignation may pave the way to overturn his argument under the leadership of the successors. That cannot be said as a responsible way for exercising leadership of a governor.

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