Chronology of Shiga Prefecture’s news bits for January-June 2013. Compiled by Philbert Ono.
Jan. 4: Shiga Governor Yukiko Kada announces that she is resigning from her Tomorrow Party of Japan (Mirai no To) political party that she and Ichiro Ozawa formed a little over a month ago. Tomorrow Party of Japan’s Diet numbers shrank from 61 seats to only 9. Meanwhile, Ichiro Ozawa took over the party and renamed it.
Feb. 24: Miki Ito wins World Cup dual moguls in Inawashiro, Fukushima. It is her first freestyle moguls World Cup victory.
Feb. 26: Shiga Governor Yukiko Kada rejects the governor of Kyoto’s statement favoring a merger of Kyoto and Shiga Prefectures.
April 1: Over 70 percent of supermarkets in Shiga Prefecture starts to charge 5 yen for a plastic shopping bag. Some 150 supermarkets in Shiga, including 71 Heiwado supermarket branches (like Friend Mart), starts charging 5 yen plastic shopping bags (レジ袋) for groceries. The money collected from shopping bag sales will be used for environmental preservation. Currently, about 50 percent of shoppers bring their own bags for groceries. The prefecture wants to raise this to 80 percent in three years.
June 20: Shiga Prefectural government employee, 32-year-old HOTTA Satoru (堀田 悟), an engineer (主任技師) in the Agricultural Operation Division of Shiga Prefecture’s Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (農政水産部・農業経営課 is arrested for using his camera phone to take upskirt photos of a 27-year-old woman sitting next to him on the train. The incident occurred on June 19, 2013 at around 5:45 pm while the suspect was on a JR Tokaido Line train on his way home to Kyoto’s Fushimi-ku. The train was running from Yamashina Station to Kyoto Station.
