TOKYO (Parliament Politics Magazine) – Growing public resistance to event over taxpayer costs and the former prime minister’s affiliation with the Unification cult.
Despite mounting public resistance to the proposal, Japan could possibly spend about 1.65 billion yen (£10.1 million) on the increasingly divisive state funeral for the late former PM Shinzo Abe, who was shot dead in July while giving a campaign speech.
A majority of citizens oppose the ceremony, according to polls, because of the expense to the public and information about the connections between the Unification church and the governing party politicians. The government was put under a lot of pressure to cancel the funeral.
The government’s initial estimation of the funeral, which is set to happen on September 27, would cost a modest amount of 250 million yen. However, later it was acknowledged that the figure did not cover expenses for hosting foreign dignitaries and security arrangements.
The chief cabinet secretary, Hirokazu Matsuno, said on Tuesday that the cost of hosting the event is expected to be 800 million yen, and accommodating foreign delegations would add another 600 million yen to the tab.
Matsuno responded to a query speculating that overall costs would total approximately 1.7 billion yen. He said if they were to give a simple estimate, he guessed the total would be pretty much to what was said.
The Kyodo news agency reported over 6,000 people, including Emmanuel Macron, Barack Obama and Kamala Harris, are expected to be at the ceremony at the Nippon Budokan hall in Tokyo. Out of the 190 overseas delegations, some 50 will include “head of state–level” VIPs, Matsuno said.
The new amount was criticised by Jun Azumi, opposition Constitutional Democratic party’s MP, who noted that costs were over six times greater than the government’s first estimate.
Following disclosures of connections between members of the ruling Liberal Democratic party and the Unification church, whose adherents are known as Moonies colloquially, public resistance to the proposals has become more intense in recent weeks.
Tetsuya Yamagami, the shooting suspect, informed police that he chose Abe as his target because he supported the church, which he claimed was the reason his family went bankrupt.
In a video greeting of congratulations that he sent to a church-affiliated group last year, Abe lauded their dedication to traditional family values. Nobusuke Kishi, a former PM, His grandfather, had a significant role in promoting church in Japan as a post-war fortification against communism.
The ceremony will be the first of its kind since 1967, when Shigeru Yoshida, the postwar PM, was accorded a state funeral. The opinion polls suggest the PM, Fumio Kishida, had failed to secure public approval for the ceremony.
Last week, Kishida stated that he knew how the Unification church controversy had hurt the public’s trust in politics and that he would insist that party MPs sever their ties to the group. He stated that the general population would not be compelled to mourn Abe, a divisive conservative who resigned in 2020 after serving as Japan’s prime minister for the longest period of time.
