Most Japanese companies want Olympics cancelled or postponed again: Survey

Tokyo, Aug 21 (IANS): A recent poll shows that more than half of Japanese companies want the Tokyo Olympic Games to be cancelled or postponed again.

Japan’s Kyodo news agency said on Thursday that in the online survey by Tokyo Shoko Research covering 12,857 companies, 27.8 per cent want the Tokyo Games to be cancelled while 25.8 per cent said the sporting event should be postponed again.

That means a combined 53.6 per cent of the responding firms are against holding the games from July 23 to August 8, 2021, writes Xinhua news agency.

The survey, which was conducted between July 28 and August 11, shows that 46.2 per cent want the games to go ahead in some way — 22.5 per cent are in favour of holding the Olympics as planned, 18.4 per cent want it to be held but with fewer spectators and 5.3 per cent without any spectators.

Japan is suffering a second wave of Covid-19 infections, with new confirmed cases increased by 1178 in the country and 339 in Tokyo.

Tokyo Governor Koike Yuriko is urging residents to take thorough precautions in every aspect of daily life.

Tokyo 2020 organising committee president Yoshiro Mori has said that the delayed Tokyo Olympics, originally scheduled from July 24 to August 9 this year, could not be held next year if Covid-19 pandemic continues as it is. He also said that the games will have to be cancelled if it could not be held next year.

The organisers will start discussing concrete countermeasures against Covid-19 this autumn onwards with the Japanese government and Tokyo Metropolitan government.