News Analysis: Japan's gov't likened to Imperial Army as financial spat casts shadow over Tokyo 2020 Olympics

Tokyo Olympic Organizers on Friday releasing a list of 26 prospective sports that have applied to be included in the 2020 Summer Olympic Games here, but a bitter financial spat between the local and central government has cast a shadow over the quadrennial sporting spectacle, which usually generates excitement and anticipation among sports fans around the world.

The sports making a bid for a spot in the Games include American football, bowls, chess, dance sport, floorball, frisbee, korfball, polo, wushu and tug of war -- the latter of which featured in the Games every year between 1900 and 1920 and, if it makes the shortlist, would see Great Britain defend its title won at the Antwerp Olympics almost 100 years ago.

But some argue that some sports are never heard of by organizers and some would not have featured in the Games for more than a century if selected.

Toshiro Muto, director of the Tokyo 2020 Organizing Committee said on Friday at a press conference that he'd never heard of some of the sports and along with former prime minister Yoshiro Mori, president of the Tokyo Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, have intimated that sports that will require additional stadiums or facilities will likely be dropped.

"We have three criteria in deciding which sports will be chosen. They must be popular with young people, give momentum to Tokyo 2020 and meet IOC standards," said Muto, adding that sports that won't require new venues will be given preference.

Mori, for his part, said that there were sports on this list that are not played in Japan, and, as such, he reiterated that money won't be spent on venues that aren't going to attract Japanese spectators.

"There are some sports that frankly I'd never heard of. Sports that appeal to the younger generation will be among the criteria, but we also have to be mindful of cost. It would be difficult to choose a sport if it required the construction of a completely new venue," the former prime minister said.

Tokyo's financial spat with the central government over the cost of building the main Olympic Stadium and where the finances will come from, will likely mean that baseball and softball, the former widely regarded as Japan's national sport, united under the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), which have been cut from the 2008 Games held in Beijing, will return to the games.

Other Japanese sporting mainstays including karate and sumo will also likely make the cut, despite the lack of global appeal of sumo.

The 26 sports will all be ranked by the committee and a shortlist will be compiled on June 22 and following pitches made by the various international sports federations in August, the organizing committee here will submit its final proposal to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for approval.

"I think its a shame that because the government's run into financial problems over the construction of the new stadium, sports that are gaining popularity in the world and could really use the boost of an international platform like the Games, sports like frisbee (flying disc) and wakeboarding, will likely not get the nod from the organizing committee here," said Sid Lloyd, a notable sports pundit and operator of international soccer leagues and academies in Japan.

"It's pretty typical that Japan has found a way to include the sports it is best at, like baseball, sumo and karate for example, but outside of the United States and Japan, nobody cares about baseball and, as for karate and sumo, I' go as far as to say that no one inside or outside Japan finds these sports particularly interesting to watch or support," Lloyd said, quipping that he'd rather watch endless hours of chess matches, than see overweight, grown men in their underwear aggressively cuddling each other.

Approval by the IOC has been given for sites of 8 sports, and the venues of 26 sports have been decided, with plans for only 2 yet to be finalized, but IOC President Thomas Bach has voiced concerns about the construction and costs of the new national stadium.

The original projected cost of the stadium to be built based on a design by Zaha Hadid, a renown Iraqi-British architect, who also designed the aquatics center for the 2012 London Olympics, was around 1 billion U.S. dollars for an 80,000 seater stadium that some believe looks like a spaceship and others a futuristic bicycle helmet. But following Tokyo successfully winning the bid, the construction costs ballooned to more than 2 billion dollars, causing Bach to call for costs to be reined in.

A scaled-down version of the design was pitched to be smaller and more cost-effective and was priced at a doable 1.3 billion dollars, but those contracted to build the stadium have said that the actual cost will be significantly more as the cost of materials has risen and will continue to do so as long as the yen is comparatively weak.

Builders have, due to the ongoing and protracted wrangling on the issue, said that the stadium may now not even be completed on time and local campaigners are petitioning the government because they believe that the new stadium has not been designed "in harmony" with Tokyo's skyline, will necessitate thousands of trees being cutdown to create enough space and have said that the stadium's lack of a fixed roof makes it unsustainable for use in the future, for the likes of concerts for example, with the debt for the stadium's construction likely being passed on to the next generation of Tokyo taxpayers.

Japan's education and sports minister Hakubun Shimomura has called on the Tokyo Metropolitan government to pay around 400 million dollars of the stadium's construction costs, which has sparked fury from local city officials, including Tokyo Governor Yoichi Masuzoe, who recently slammed the central government for " behaving like the Imperial Army."

Masuzoe, reluctant for Tokyo to be browbeaten into making up for the stadium's financial shortfall due to poor planning on the part of the central government, has also blasted recent moves by the government as being "unconstitutional."

Shimomura threatened Masuzoe last week with passing legislation that would effectively force Tokyo to pick up the tab -- a threat which Masuzoe dismissed indignantly.

"It's written in the constitution that you cannot establish a new law without gaining a majority of votes in a local referendum, " Masuzoe was quoted as saying on a local TV news station.

"Tokyo's citizens will be annoyed at hearing such a statement," said the feisty governor, adding that calls from the central government claiming "we can't build it," (the stadium) were simply irresponsible, at this late stage.

"That's like the Japanese Imperial Army during the war saying ' we're winning, we're winning' -- when in fact we were losing," Masuzoe remarked pointedly. Endi