Will Tokyo 2020 be the games of rebirth? Many uncertainties remain, but preparations for the postponed Olympics are not stopping, and in Japan there is a great desire to host the major event.
In Japan there are still many traces of the event that was supposed to take place this summer. The Olympic logo is visible throughout the city of Tokyo, on flags along the streets, on buildings and on countless products in shops. Members of some national teams, such as those of Mongolia and South Sudan, continue to train in the locations they had chosen for the final push before the games. And the Olympic torch, replaced by a lantern, is on display at a sports centre in Fukushima. The coronavirus pandemic forced the world to a halt, and the "road to Tokyo" had also been put on pause. But with the announcement of the new dates it has resumed, like the clock outside the city's main station, which has started counting down to the Olympics once again.
The news has just broken that five Tokyo 2020 merchandise shops are closing their doors. Partly because the national state of emergency has persuaded many traders to suspend their activities, and partly because there is still considerable uncertainty about what will happen in the months ahead. This is just one example of how the process of postponing the Olympics runs in parallel with efforts to contain the pandemic.
Both the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the Tokyo 2020 organising committee have established new task forces to organise the biggest event in the international calendar twelve months later. Broadly speaking, the plan should follow what was envisaged for 2020 — including on sustainability — with the addition of a task force dealing with health measures against Covid-19. There is also the possibility that the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympic and Paralympic Games could be merged into a single opening event and a single closing event, according to statements by organising committee president Yoshiro Mori. The former Japanese prime minister also said that if the games cannot be held next year they will be cancelled. Prominent figures such as Yoshitake Yokokura, president of the country's medical association, have made clear that the event cannot go ahead unless a vaccine is found soon — although not everyone sees it that way.
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The Tokyo Metropolitan Government estimates that the Olympics should generate 275 billion euros for the Japanese economy in the period between 2013, when they were officially awarded, and 2030. Furthermore, forecasts for this year spoke of two million more foreign tourists on top of the 32 million who visited last year. "So there is the lost money — that is, what would have been spent between June and September of this year," explains Leo Lewis, the Financial Times correspondent in Tokyo, "and the best estimate is just under three billion euros. That said, this sum could be spent in 2021, and in reality tourism has stalled not because of the postponement but because of the pandemic, so the figures are somewhat distorted. The bigger question is how much extra money is needed to organise the games next year." The bulk of the 23-billion-euro budget has been spent and most of the infrastructure is already in place, but "according to the estimates the Japanese are using internally, the cost of the postponement will be between two and six billion."
There is also the far from trivial question of who will bear these costs (the balance seems to tip towards the Tokyo government and the national government), an issue that matters above all to "those Japanese who believe that hosting the games is not a good use of the country's finances," Lewis points out. For now, the parties involved are engaged in complex discussions to establish a framework that nonetheless remains unclear. It is interesting to understand how people, especially in Japan, are perceiving this process.
Despite the sceptics, many are enthusiastic that the country has been chosen to host the games: "it is a great honour and a unique opportunity for my people," says Hiroko Imai, a content creator and influencer who lives in the host city. "When I found out that Tokyo had been chosen, I was absolutely overjoyed," recalls climbing legend Akiyo Noguchi, a multiple international title-winner and member of the Japanese Olympic team. For her, at thirty years old, "these games are the last stage of my career as an athlete." It is hard to imagine that the euphoria did not turn to disappointment when the postponement of the Olympics was announced, but according to many observers the general reaction has been one of acceptance: shikata ga nai, "there is nothing to be done."
"I expected some people to be disappointed," explains Imai, who conducted several interviews around Tokyo to gauge people's reactions. "But almost everyone believes it was the best decision, because people's lives and health come first. Almost all those interviewed said they felt relieved." Indeed, Lewis recounts how "the country breathed a sigh of relief because it can now genuinely focus on containing the damage of the epidemic." Priorities have shifted not only at a practical level but also in terms of communication. "Before, Japanese television did not give much coverage to the risks associated with Covid-19," according to Imai, "but now the approach has changed."
"I had mixed feelings when I heard about the postponement because my training had been focused on being ready by August," says Noguchi. "But now I am happy to be able to continue doing what I love for another year. I want to show my fans that I have evolved even further." The expectations of athletes therefore remain high, even in her sport, which is set to make its Olympic debut. "In general, we Japanese are physically smaller, so there are not many disciplines in which we excel," reveals Shimon Torii, owner of a climbing gym in Tokyo, "but the fact that climbing is one of the sports in which we are the favourites is fantastic. Hosting the games means being able to show how strong we are."
Torii's eyes light up as he speaks about the sport to which he has dedicated his life, despite it being "an economically difficult period." Indeed, national attention is focused more on the current emergency than on the postponement of the Olympics. While Japan does appear to be flattening the infection curve, some believe that "the government is not doing a good job of supporting its citizens," in Torii's words. So much so that "even though culturally we Japanese do not tend to raise our voices, many people have complained about the government's aid plan," Imai recounts, "which, in response, has changed its policies."
Although these are the issues on the agenda for now, the prospect of Tokyo 2020 remains an important point of reference — and not only in a temporal sense. "The Olympic flame represents the light at the end of the tunnel," said John Coates, who chairs the IOC's coordination commission. "Japan also needs to keep this dream alive," because according to Lewis, "if in a year's time we are preparing for the games of rebirth, even if there are some restrictions, it would be a great victory." The priority now is for nations to return to a position where they are able to participate in the Olympics. "Realistically, it is still too early to know whether they will truly be the light at the end of the tunnel," in Lewis's words, but if the games were to remain a symbol of hope for people around the world, then the pandemic will not have been able to extinguish our collective spirit of resilience.