JAPAN: Komeito’s Withdrawal & more – 16th Oct 2025

Konnichiwa from BA! This is the Rorshok Japan Update from the 16th of October twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Japan.

Tetsuo Saito, the leader of the political party Komeito, told Sanae Takaichi, the new president of the Liberal Democratic Party or LDP, that his party will withdraw from the ruling coalition, ending a twenty-five-year alliance. Saito said the party never properly addressed political funding concerns and refused to restrict corporate and organizational donations. Saito said that reforming political finance is Komeito’s top priority.

Takaichi hopes to be elected prime minister when the Diet convenes, but Saito said Komeito lawmakers will not support her unless the LDP promises to implement certain policies. The biggest one is banning political donations from companies and organizations to prevent another slush fund incident like the one from twenty twenty-three.

Without Komeito’s support, there’s a good chance the LDP president won’t become prime minister.

The political uncertainty has affected other areas as well, specifically the financial industry. Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell over 700 points, or about 1.5 percent, after it opened on Tuesday the 14th following Komeito’s announcement that it would leave its partnership with the ruling political party.

Another thing that likely affected the stock index was US President Donald Trump’s plan to impose a 100 percent tariff on Chinese imports. Those who trade in stocks say that it’s risky to invest in anything when there’s so much domestic and international uncertainty.

While 1.5 percent might not be the biggest drop the Nikkei 225 has ever experienced, it’s notable when tied to big current events like this since it may signal more drastic changes in the near future.

In an update to a story from previous shows, the World Expo in Osaka officially ended its six-month run on Monday the 13th. The expo held a closing ceremony that day, and figures such as Crown Prince Akishino, former prime minister Shigeru Ishiba, and the Osaka governor gave speeches. The event drew over twenty-five million visitors from 158 countries and regions, and exceeded its break-even point. The operating profit is expected to be between twenty-three and twenty-eight billion yen, which is between 150 and 180 million dollars.

As part of the ceremony, the expo organizers passed the Bureau International des Expositions flag to Saudi Arabia, which will host the twenty thirty Riyadh Expo.

In other news, the Izu islands, south of Tokyo, were hit by the second typhoon within the span of a week on Monday the 13th. The storm damaged shops and factories already hit by the previous typhoon. It brought winds up to 153 kilometers or ninety-five miles per hour and 130 millimeters or five inches of rain in twelve hours.

Damage includes a shop selling lunch boxes or bento, whose roof was destroyed in the earlier typhoon, only to get flooded by the second one, and also a vegetable company whose factory had a wall ripped off. About 510 households lost power, some areas faced water outages, and around 140 residents stayed at evacuation centers during the second typhoon.

Meanwhile, a Tokyo government survey found that forty-four percent of men used parasols this summer, nearly half for the first time. In Japan, most people see parasols as being for women, but with the heat getting so extreme, people start to care less about gender stereotypes and more about staying cool. Ninety-one percent of women who took the survey said they used a parasol, and among men, it was mostly those in their twenties and thirties who were willing to use them. Most of the men who participated in the survey said they felt little or no discomfort being seen with one.

Japan experienced record heat, with an average temperature of almost two and a half degrees Celsius or seven degrees Fahrenheit above normal and a national high of 41.8 degrees Celsius or 107 degrees Fahrenheit in Gunma Prefecture, eastern Japan.

In business news, the government plans to promote domestic AI development to reduce Japan’s reliance on foreign technology. The plan calls for improving pay and conditions for AI talent; advancing next-generation chips; and encouraging universities, research institutes, and businesses to work together to improve tech as much as possible.

The plan will also address risks such as misinformation and cyberattacks while trying to make Japan more AI-friendly.

On an unrelated note, Kurasushi, a popular conveyor-belt sushi chain, said that a viral video, posted on Saturday the 11th, showed female students at one of its branches messing with other customers’ food—opening sushi covers, touching sushi with bare hands, and even licking a soy sauce bottle. The students posted this video and a second, similar one on a social media app called BeReal.

Kurasushi figured out which branches the videos were shot in, and said it replaced all affected food and condiments, cleaned containers, and is talking to the police about what legal steps to take.

Online users condemned the girls’ behavior, calling it disgusting and childish, with many pointing out that thanks to the security camera footage in Kurasushi’s stores, they thankfully won’t get away with it.

The newspaper Asahi Shimbun talked on Wednesday the 15th about the graffiti problem in the Arashiyama bamboo forest, a UNESCO World Heritage site in Kyoto, western Japan. Kyoto officials recently found that 350 bamboo stalks had Roman letters and Asian scripts carved into them.

Officials believe that the vandalism is partly owed to the post-pandemic increase in tourism, but said it’s a big problem since deep cuts in bamboo can kill the plants. They may have to get rid of severely damaged stalks and are currently telling visitors to act responsibly.

Next up, the Environment Ministry said on Thursday the 16th that bears have killed seven people this year, the highest number since records began in two thousand six. At least 108 people have been injured since bear hibernation ended in April, up from the eighty-five injured in twenty twenty-four.

Officials said the increase in bear attacks are likely because of climate change, bears having less available food, and fewer people living in rural areas, which encourages bears to move closer to more populated towns. Recent incidents include a bear going inside a supermarket in Gunma Prefecture, eastern Japan, and attacks in Iwate Prefecture, in the north.

In sports news, sumo fans from across Europe gathered at the Royal Albert Hall in London for the first overseas Grand Sumo Tournament in twenty years. The five-day event, which sold out all 27,000 tickets, began on Wednesday the 15th with a purification ceremony led by referees.

Grand Champion Hoshoryu said he was happy to see a sumo ring in the historic hall and was eager to compete. European fans were overjoyed to see their favorite sumo wrestlers in person, some even saying they were almost moved to tears. The Japan Sumo Association hopes the event, followed by another tournament in Paris next year, will make even more people all over the world interested in sumo wrestling.

In previous shows, we have reported that officials in Shizuoka and Yamanashi Prefecture, central Japan, have implemented a lot of new rules this year for climbing Mount Fuji. As a result, the number of stranded climbers in twenty twenty-five using Shizuoka’s trail dropped to thirty-six, which is forty-four percent fewer than last year, when sixty-four people got stranded and six died. The trails on the Yamanashi side also saw fewer accidents.

The new rules include restricting entry without lodge reservations to stop bullet climbing (where people try to climb the mountain through the night without rest) and having officials at the trail entrances closely monitor whether hikers are properly equipped.

Most people’s reaction to this news has been positive. Online users who had actually hiked Mount Fuji this year said that as far as they could tell, officials weren’t being too strict about the rules, but they would stop anyone who was clearly unprepared.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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Mata Ne!