Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga at the prime minister's office. (Mainichi/Kan Takeuchi)

       TOKYO -- In the past, whenever the Olympic Games have been held in Japan, prime ministers have resigned. Will Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga be able to overcome this jinx, and continue in his post past the end of his tenure as ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) president and hence prime minister?

       With the Summer Olympics underway in Tokyo, Suga is trying to create conditions to boost his administration's popularity in time for both the next House of Representatives election, which must be called by the autumn, and the LDP presidential election, also set for the fall.

       The Olympics have previously been held in Japan in Tokyo in 1964 (Oct. 10-24), in Sapporo in 1972 (Feb. 3-13), and in Nagano in 1998 (Feb. 7-22).

       The 1964 Tokyo Summer Olympics -- the first Olympics held in Asia -- took place when Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda was in office. Shortly after he assumed the post in 1960, he initiated the income doubling plan, and decided to use the Olympics as a tool to spark economic growth. He promoted massive infrastructure projects such as the Tokaido Shinkansen bullet train line and Tokyo's Metropolitan Expressway. The 1964 Olympics came to symbolize Japan's high economic growth period.

       But in September 1964, just one month before the games' opening ceremony, Ikeda was hospitalized. He was diagnosed with cancer, but neither he nor the public was initially told this. Ikeda left the hospital temporarily to attend the opening ceremony with the permission of his doctors. Requiring further treatment, he resigned the day after the closing ceremony, on Oct. 25. He died the next year.

       Eisaku Sato was prime minister during the 1972 Sapporo Winter Olympics. That May, the goal to which Sato had devoted his entire political career was realized: Okinawa's return from U.S. control. The day after the ordinary session of the Diet ended in June, he announced his resignation. Okinawa's reversion to Japan became the great achievement with which to close out his long tenure -- seven years and eight months -- as prime minister.

       As for the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympics, then Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto had high expectations that the games would "help Japan's economic recovery," and therefore raise the administration's approval ratings. But the LDP suffered a devastating loss in the House of Councillors election five months later. To take responsibility for the loss, Hashimoto was forced to resign.

       The resignation jinx also applies to years when the Olympics were planned to take place in Japan, but didn't. It is still fresh in our minds that then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced his resignation in August 2020 citing a worsening chronic health condition when the 2020 Tokyo Summer Games were postponed for a year due to the coronavirus pandemic. In 1940, when the Tokyo Games and Sapporo Winter Games were canceled due to World War II, the prime minister changed twice.

       Suga's current term as LDP president ends at the end of September. He has indicated that he intends to dissolve the House of Representatives during his tenure and seek reelection as LDP head. There have been no moves to bring Suga down within the party, and no internal rivals have emerged.

       But coronavirus infections are rising, and a portion of the public has criticized holding the Olympics even while Tokyo is under a coronavirus state of emergency. Public opinion polls carried out by several media outlets in July showed the Suga Cabinet's approval rating at its lowest ever. The future appears uncertain.

       In an interview carried in the July 20 issue of Sports Hochi, Suga said, "I want to make the games ones that people will ultimately say were 'good to go ahead with.'" The prime minister appears to be aiming for a breakthrough with a successful Tokyo Games, but one LDP source said before the opening of the Olympics, "I wonder if we'll be able to reach the end of the games saying, 'Fewer people got the coronavirus during the games than we expected.' If the daily infection numbers hit 3,000 or 4,000 in Tokyo, he will have to step down."

       In Tokyo, 4,058 people were newly confirmed infected with the coronavirus on July 31, topping 4,000 for the first time. The figure climbed again to a record 4,166 on Aug. 4.

       (Japanese original by Kota Takamoto, Political News Department)

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