Photo/Illutration Some establishments in Tokyo's Shinbashi district remain open after 8 p.m. on May 21. (Nobuo Fujiwara)

The remaining state of emergency for Tokyo, Hokkaido and three prefectures could be lifted as early as May 25, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe indicated on May 21.

That has prompted Tokyo metropolitan government officials to accelerate their plans to get the local economy back on track.

After announcing the same day that the state of emergency was being lifted for Osaka, Hyogo and Kyoto prefectures, Abe said in the five areas still under it, “While the number of new infections is decreasing, there still continues to be a risk” of another uptick.

But he added that the government’s expert panel on infectious diseases and economics would be consulted again on May 25 to determine if the state of emergency in Tokyo, Hokkaido, and Chiba, Saitama and Kanagawa prefectures could be lifted before the current May 31 deadline.

That possibility led Tokyo metropolitan government officials to compile measures to relax the various requests made to local businesses to shorten business hours or close their doors.

The metropolitan government on May 15 announced a three-step program for allowing various facilities to reopen.

In step one, museums, art museums and libraries would be allowed to reopen. In step two, facilities that have not reported COVID-19 cluster infections and do not have confined and congested areas where people are in close contact with each other would be allowed to reopen. All other facilities would be permitted to reopen in step three.

Along with the reopenings, the metropolitan government is now considering relaxing the restrictions it requested on bars and restaurants to voluntarily adhere to at each point of the three-step process.

Under the plan, during step one, restaurants and bars would be allowed to extend business hours until 10 p.m. from the current requested closing time of 8 p.m.

If the state of emergency is lifted for Tokyo on May 25, the new business hours would be permitted from around June 1.

The closing time for the establishments would be further pushed back at each step along the metropolitan government’s three-stage plan.

Sources said there was also the possibility that the step one measures could be implemented from before June 1 if the state of emergency is lifted on May 25.

(This article was compiled from reports by Dai Nagata, Yusuke Nagano and Rihito Karube.)

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