2002 Amagasaki mayoral election

Amagasaki, Hyōgo held a mayoral election on November 17, 2002. Aya Shirai, backed by the Japanese Communist Party (JCP) and the local group Amagasaki Residents Group for Democratic City Administration defeated the incumbent Yoshio Miyata, who had been mayor since before the Great Hanshin Earthquake尼崎市長 http://www.archives.city.amagasaki.hyogo.jp/apedia/index.php?key=%E5%B0%BC%E5%B4%8E%E5%B8%82%E9%95%B7 dead https://web.archive.org/web/20191117043229/http://www.archives.city.amagasaki.hyogo.jp/apedia/index.php?key=%E5%B0%BC%E5%B4%8E%E5%B8%82%E9%95%B7 2019-11-17 archives.city.amagasaki.hyogo.jp and ran on a platform of cutting costs.尼崎市の福祉削減プログラム http://amanetzh.com/hukusizh/amasakugen.htm dead https://web.archive.org/web/20170119065736/http://amanetzh.com/hukusizh/amasakugen.htm 2017-01-19 amanetzh.com Miyata had been heavily favored in the raceSunday Mainichi, Volume 82, Number 1 (2003), p.147. but later came under criticism for his willingness to accept over 35 million yen in severance pay from the city."Amagasaki shichōsen: Shimin to Nihon Kyōsantō ga kyōdō", Shimbun Akahata, 19 November 2012. Retrieved 2018-06-15. Miyata's loss effectively marked the end of the Five Party Cooperative Alliance (Rengō Gotō Kyōgikai) that had been established in 1994 to combat the influence of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Japanese Communist Party in Hyōgo Prefecture;Katsutoshi Kuroda and Mikio Wakabayashi, "Hatsu no tōitsu kenpō shūkai: Minshū to kyōsan kikikan kyōyū", Kobe Shimbun, 7 May 2016. Retrieved 2018-06-15. Miyata's victory in Amagasaki in 1994 had been the first electoral victory of the Alliance. Historically, this was the second time a woman was elected mayor in Hyogo Prefecture, and was a precursor to the city electing the youngest female mayor in Japanese history, Kazumi Inamura, in 2010.https://www.globalgreens.org/statements/japan_green_mayor Kazumi Inamura receives 54% of the vote to become the first Green mayor elected in Japan 2010-11-22 Global Greens 2018-06-03 en 2017-02-28 https://web.archive.org/web/20170228075425/https://www.globalgreens.org/statements/japan_green_mayor dead This represented the first time successive women had been elected mayor in Japan, evidence of a shift from the previous lack of women acting as heads of local and prefectural governments, and has been attributed in part to women's activism in the wake of the Great Hanshin Earthquake.Akio Igarashi and Miranda A. Schreurs, Jōsei ga seiji wo kaeru toki: Giin, shichō, chiji no keiken [When Women Change Politics: The Experiences of Representatives, Mayors, and Governors] (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2012), p. 311-316. According to Atsushi Tsujikawa, as "an event symbolic of the period", Shirai's election was "featured widely in mass media and became a topic of conversation throughout the country."「そういった時代を象徴するできごとのひとつとしてマスコミに大きく取り上げられ、全国的に話題を呼びました。」Atsushi Tsujikawa, "Hanshin/Awaji daishinsai ga motarashita mono" ["Effects of the Hanshin/Awaji Disaster"]. Retrieved 2018-06-15. Amagasaki mayoral election, 2002: Amagasaki JCP Aya Shirai 62,308 52.1 LDP, DPJ, NKP, NCP Yoshio Miyata 57,385 47.9 References Japan Press coverage Category:Amagasaki Category:Elections in Hyōgo Prefecture Category:2002 elections in Japan Category:Mayoral elections in Japan Category:November 2002 in Japan