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Tokyo
2020 chief, Yoshiro Mori, says baseball/softball in 2020 would be a
"big plus".
TOKYO
-- As support for baseball and softball to be included in the Tokyo 2020
Olympic Games continues to mount across Japan, with a growing chorus from
all parts of the globe, the political group consisting of 67 Diet Members
campaigning for baseball and softball at the Olympic Games assembled in
Tokyo for the second time in a month last Tuesday, November 18 in the
Japanese Diet.
Kazuhiro
Tawa, Senior Advisor of Baseball Federation of Japan, and Taeko Utsugi,
Vice President of Japan Softball Association -- as well as World Baseball
Softball Confederation (WBSC) executive member -- made presentations to the
supportive Diet members, exchanged ideas and were encouraged to expand the
baseball/softball Olympic inclusion campaign.
The
Diet Federation members from the LDP of Japan recognized the ongoing work
by the baseball/softball family, including the screening of the promotional
video on the stadium jumbotron during the recent WBSC-sanctioned
"Japan Series" between the top-ranked Japanese National Baseball
Team, Samurai Japan, and the MLB All-Stars at the Tokyo Dome, and
University/High School Baseball Championship at Meiji Jingu Stadium.
Immediately
following the Diet meeting, the 40-proposal Olympic Agenda 2020 reform
programme was released from the International Olympic Committee's
headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland.
The
potential reforms being introduced by the IOC would allow host cities to
propose the inclusion of one or more events for their games -- a move which
would clear the way for baseball and softball to be included in the 2020
Games.
IOC
Vice-President John Coates, who was visiting Tokyo with his IOC
Coordination Commission team, and Chairman of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic
Organizing Committee Yoshiro Mori, spoke to the media on how the IOC
President Thomas Bach's reform agenda could affect planning for Tokyo 2020.
"In
the case of Japan, including baseball and softball would be a great
idea," Mori said at the news conference last Wednesday. "The two
sports are very popular in Japan and having them on the program would be a
big plus."
The
Olympic Agenda 2020 reforms will be put to a vote by the full IOC
membership at a special session in Monaco on December 8-9.
The first/last bid from the new
world governing body, WBSC, to include baseball and softball in the 2020
Olympic Games was at the 125th IOC Session in Buenos Aires, Argentina in
September 2013, where wrestling was voted back onto the official Olympic
Programme the day after Tokyo was announced as the host of the 2020 Olympic
Games.
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