Anticipation is building among Japan’s sumo fans as they wait to find out if the country’s first female minister, Sanae Takaichi, will buck centuries of tradition to present a trophy later this month.
In the 11 days of the current 15-day tournament in Fukuoka, southwestern Japan, the sports officials are left with the possibility of Cugnt between Takaichi and the Japan Sumo Association.
Women are forbidden to enter, or even touch, the “sacred” arena, because of a belief found in Shinto, the Japanese religion, that they are “bad” because of menstrual blood.
When asked if Takaichi will push for permission to present the trophy to the Prime Minister in a week, the chief secretary of the Cabinet, Minoru Kihara, did not give a definite answer.
“The Prime Minister wants to respect the tradition and culture of SUMO,” he told reporters this week, according to Jiji Press News Agency. “The government has not yet taken a decision on this matter. We will consider an appropriate response based on the will of the Prime Minister.”
Kihara’s reference to tradition suggests that Takaichi, a social conservative, could not avoid reigning in the controversy over the banning of professional SUO by women. Today, women are allowed to enter the ring, as competitors and referees, in amateur sumo.
The controversy resurfaced in 1990, when Japan’s first female Cabinet chief wanted to present the Prime Minister’s trophy on her behalf. The Sumo Association rejected his request, with the chair stating that “there is at least one organization like the Shimbun.
A decade later, the governor of Osaka, Onaka ohta, was forced to present a prize of a walto to Dohyo after the Sumo Association was allowed to enter the ring.
The issue resurfaced in 2018 at an exhibition tournament in Maizuru, near Kyoto, when the local mayor, Ryozo Tatami, woke up while giving a speech at the center of Dohyo.
Several female speeders, including a nurse, rushed to first aid Tatami, who suffered a stroke, prompting the referee to repeatedly call the PA System to finish it. The girls refused to leave.
The officials sprinkled “Putlifying” salt on the surface of the interior after they finished taking care of the Tatami, although the SUO officials denied that it was done because of the Ring. Salt was traditionally scattered in the ring before fights and after a wrestler was injured.
The incident caused an outcry, forcing the chairman of the Sumo Association, Hakkaku, to apologize for the “inappropriate actions of the referee.
Days later, however, the guardians of the sport came under fire again for refusing to allow Tomoko Nakagaga, who was then the Mayor of Takarazuka, to give a speech from an exhibition tournament. Forced to give her address from ringside, Nakagawa drew applause from the audience when she said she felt “treated” by her treatment as a woman.
In 2019, the Sumo association formed a panel of outside experts to review the women’s ban, but this has not yet happened, the Asahi reported this month.
Some prime ministers – most recently Shigeru Ishiba – present a trophy to the winner of the elite makuuchi Division, while others are represented by government officials.
The sight of Takaichi riding in Doho was not only a symbolic victory for women’s rights campaigners; This will not hurt his politics as he tries to revive his party’s political fortunes.
Most followers of Sumo believe that the sport entered a golden age after it was rocked by Scandal, including the wrestlers of the watchful eyes of their strong eyes of their strong eyes of their strong eyes of their strong eyes.
Tickets for the six annual tournaments sold out quickly, while local fans celebrated this year when Onosato became the first born in Japan yokozuna Grand champion for eight years. The sport, which some say has been going back more than 1,500 years, is opening after a wildly successful tournament at the Royal Albert Hall – its first appearance in 34 years.