Photo/Illutration Yoshiro Mori, former prime minister, in May (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

A bevy of top leaders in business and the sports circles is raising funds to build a bust of Yoshiro Mori, former president of the Tokyo Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, who resigned in 2021 after making sexist remarks. 

The fund-raising campaign was started to "praise his achievements" in sports. 

According to a document obtained by The Asahi Shimbun, the 15 leaders initiated a project to commemorate Mori’s contribution in Japan’s successful bidding for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as well as the 2019 Rugby World Cup.

Mori, a former prime minister, became the head of the organizing committee in 2014, but resigned in February 2021 after his misogynistic remarks were widely reported.

The fund-raising campaign was launched in May this year, asking for donations of 5,000 yen ($34.80) or more to a bank account named, “Mori Yoshiro sensei honor project.”

The donor drive is not open to the public, however. The 15 founders and others have made referrals to their acquaintances.

The location of where the bust will be placed is undecided.

The 15 involved include Fujio Mitarai, chairman and CEO of Canon Inc., who served as the chairman of the organizing committee for the 2019 Rugby World Cup. Mitarai apparently initiated the fund-raising drive. 

A representative of Canon confirmed the chairman's involvement, but said, "it is a personal matter."

Saburo Kawabuchi, former chairman of the Japan Football Association, told The Asahi Shimbun that he was asked by Akira Shimazu, who served as secretary-general of the organizing committee for the 2019 Rugby World Cup, to join the project.

Kawabuchi said he has asked the Japan Top League Alliance, an organization that promotes nine sports, to make a donation. Mori serves as its honorary chairman and Kawabuchi is its chairman.

Kawabuchi said he has heard that the cost of making a bust for Mori will be about 3 million yen.

Shimazu said, “We are just raising money among ourselves as a favor.”

Seiko Hashimoto, an Upper House member who replaced Mori as the president of the Tokyo organizing committee, said in a prepared statement, that the idea of building a bust for Mori was brought up when “people close to Mori gathered together.” She is included among the 15 involved.

“I agreed to it, but I have never asked other people to make a donation,” Hashimoto said.

Toshiro Muto, who served as the Tokyo organizing committee’s secretary-general, said Shimazu approached him about joining the project.

“I was in his (Mori) debt at the Tokyo organizing committee,” Muto said.

He said he joined the list of initiators “as an individual” and “it has nothing to do with the organizing committee.”

Satoshi Ashidate, current chairman of the Japan Sport Council (JSC), is also one of the 15 involved.

A representative of the JSC, which manages and operates the Chichibunomiya rugby stadium, said Ashidate is participating in the fund-raising campaign “as a private individual.”

The construction of a new ruby stadium is scheduled to start in 2024 and a rugby museum is planned to open in the new facility.

The JSC said there is no plan to place a Mori bust inside the new museum.

A lawyer representing Mori told The Asahi Shimbun, “The new Chichibunomiya rugby stadium project is being carried out by the JSC. Yoshiro Mori is taking no part in it.”

Among the other 15 fund-raising members are Toshiaki Endo, a Lower House member who served as the Olympics minister; Ichiro Kono, former JSC chairman; and Shigetaka Mori, former chairman of the Japan Rugby Football Union.

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