Anti-Olympics protesters submit petition demanding cancellation of Tokyo games

By PTI

TOKYO: An online petition calling for the Tokyo Olympics to be cancelled has been submitted to the Tokyo government with over 350,000 signatures on Friday morning.

The rollout of the petition comes with Tokyo, Osaka and several other areas under a state of emergency with coronavirus infections rising — particularly new variants.

The state of emergency is to expire on May 31 but expected to also expand to other prefectures in the country.

The postponed Olympics are to open in just under three months on July 23rd.

The petition will also be sent to International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach, who cancelled a planned trip to Japan this month due to surging cases of COVID-19 in the country, and to International Paralympics Committee President Andrew Parsons.

Although 70-80% of Japanese citizens in polls say they want the Olympics cancelled or postponed, there is no indication this will happen.

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, Tokyo organizing committee president Seiko Hashimoto, and Bach have repeatedly said the games will go on as scheduled.

The petition was organised by Kenji Utsunomiya, a lawyer who has run several times for Tokyo governor.

It registered about 50,000 signatures in the first 24 hours after being launched on May 5th.

Utsunomiya said athletes are the victim here and says the Tokyo and the Japanese government should have decided to cancel the games earlier.