A leading member of the casino caucus in Japan’s parliament predicts a bill to legalize the industry will pass during the current special session, which means it is possible the country’s first gaming resorts could open in time for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.
Pro-casino Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has said his Liberal Democratic Party is looking to win approval for the bill before the Diet, as the national legislature is known, adjourns on November 30.
Koichi Hagiuda, an aide to Abe and secretary-general of the Diet coalition backing the bill, told Bloomberg the plan is to secure approval in the House of Representatives, where the LDP holds a solid majority, “in the first half of October,” then move toward winning passage in the upper House of Councillors, where the LDP and its coalition partners are less dominant.
“The government is preparing for this with great drive,” he said.
The bill was introduced last December, reportedly with cross-party and opposition support, but stalled during the Diet’s regular session, which ended in June. Assuming it passes in the current session, lawmakers then will move to tackle regulations covering the bidding process, licensing and taxation. Hagiuda said these will be included in a legislative package presented in the next regular session, which begins in January.
Analysts expect an initial three- to four-casino market in Japan could generate gaming revenues of upwards of US$15 billion a year, and most of the industry’s biggest global names say they’ll bid for licenses.
Hagiuda said major cities should have priority before more remote locations are considered and told Bloomberg that Tokyo, Osaka and Yokohama are the strongest candidates.
Officials in Osaka have been the most outspoken in their support and are already in negotiations with a number of major operators.
However, in Tokyo, the capital and the metropolitan area seen as crucial to the nascent market’s success, Governor Yoichi Masuzoe is cool to the idea and has said pursuing a casino is “not at the top” of his agenda.
Local officials say preparations for the Olympics have put the casino on the back burner, and it’s reported that Masuzoe has downgraded the team tasked with preparing for it.
The run-up to the Olympics also is driving up construction costs, which have risen so steeply the government is considering scaling back its plans for the Olympics, officials have told Reuters.
Those costs are likely to emerge as a major concern for gaming operators, says Satoshi Okabe, a senior manager with Dentsu, Japan’s largest advertising agency, which counts the city of Tokyo as a client.
“The reality is that preparations for the Olympics are going to be pretty challenging. Casinos are secondary,” he told Reuters. “Building costs are going to spike and foreign casino operators are going to find investment returns inefficient.”
