Tokyo elects Koike, first femal governor

9 years ago - Published in Finance, Fundamental Analysis

For the first time Tokyo will be led by a woman. The elections, which were held on Sunday to elect a new local governor, the third in three years, have seen the victory of Yuriko Koike, previously the first woman to head the Defense Ministry.
The victory, in the metropolis of 13 million residents, was obtained with a gap of more than a million votes over second classified, the rival Hiroya Masuda, supported by the Liberal Democratic Party of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

Koike, 64-year-old, graduated from the University of Cairo, speaks perfect English and Arabic and was elected as an independent candidate, despite being a member of the same Liberal Democratic Party.

In addition to collecting the votes of moderate right, Koike has earned acclaim even among sympathizers more strongly nationalist positions opposed to the participation of non-Japanese regional elections and has expressed itself against foreign immigration in Japan.

The victory has symbolic implications for the advancement of women: both because Japan is still in the bottom positions in international rankings for the presence and role of women in politics and because his election comes just a few days of the appointment of the first presidential candidate of the United States, Hillary Clinton, to which the same Koike in the past has been compared in the past.

"I will administer Tokyo through policies that have never been implemented," she told a group of enthusiastic supporters after the first indications on the victory. Among its objectives, bring back the Tokyo Asia's financial capital, accelerating the "special economic zones" creation strategy within the city limits.

The 2020 Olympics will be his target date, as his four-year term will expire in substantial coincidence with the start of the Games. One of the problems-objective will be to reduce costs, which are likely to rise at two to three times its original estimate of about seven billion dollars. The initial enthusiasm for winning the Olympic bid in 2013 has quickly scaled to errors in the budget that directed public opinion to demand greater caution.