Leading Tokyo Olympics organizers officially apologize for sexist comments that women talk too much at meetings

Leading Tokyo Olympics organizers officially apologize for sexist comments that women talk too much at meetings

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Mori, a former prime minister, made the comments at an Olympics board of trustees event on Wednesday. When asked about the Japanese Olympic Committee’s goal of increasing the number of women on its board of directors from 20% to 40%, Mori said he was concerned about how it would affect the length of the meetings.

He reportedly said that “board meetings with many women take longer” because “women are competitive – if one member raises his hand to speak, others may think they also need to speak,” according to Japanese media reports. “If you want to increase the number of women, you will be in trouble unless you set time limits,” he would have added.

Speaking at a news conference on Thursday, Mori, 83, confirmed that he made the comments behind closed doors and said he was sorry for that.

“I recognize that my comment yesterday was an inappropriate expression and was against the spirit of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. I am deeply sorry,” he said. “I would like to withdraw my comment and apologize to the people I made them feel unpleasant.”

The comments triggered an immediate fire storm in Japan, where women regularly face gender discrimination in the workplace and when seeking positions of power.

The gender gap in Japan is “by far the largest among all advanced economies”, according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Report 2020. The report ranked Japan in 121 out of 153 countries, partly because of its findings that women represent only 5.3% of the board members of listed companies and only 10% of parliamentarians, one of the lowest levels of female political representation in the world.
Mori said he is not considering leaving office, but the disaster is likely to be a major distraction for the organizing committee, which faces the difficult task of organizing the Games in less than six months, as Japan struggles to contain the rising number of cases. of coronavirus. The Summer Olympics were postponed last year due to Covid-19, and experts said it may not be possible to postpone the event again.
A survey conducted last month by the national broadcaster NHK found that 77% of people in Japan think games should be canceled or postponed. Japan’s leaders have promised that the Games will be held, however. The upward attitude emerges despite rumors of its cancellation and logistical obstacles that prevent such a massive event from taking place in the midst of a public health crisis.

The country’s medical system has been overburdened in recent days due to an increase in Covid-19 cases, with 10 municipalities affected in a state of emergency. On Wednesday, more than 8,700 people tested positive for Covid-19 in these areas were waiting to be transferred to a hospital or an isolation facility because the authorities ran out of space. Some who are waiting to be removed have mild symptoms or none at all.

CNN’s Selina Wang and journalist Chie Kobayashi contributed reporting

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