Earlier today, Prime Minister of Japan Yoshihide Suga delivered a speech during a ceremony at Nagasaki Peace Park in Nagasaki, southern Japan. He thanked the people responsible for helping the country host the Olympics under the difficulties of the coronavirus pandemic and ensuring all safety measures throughout the games.
He mentioned the delay of the Olympic Games by a year and about it being held under tight restrictions without the fans in an empty stadium.
“I believe we were able to fulfil our responsibility as the host nation,” said Prime Minister, Yoshihide Suga after thanking the people for their understanding and cooperation.
Support for the Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga interestingly slid underneath 30% since he took over the office. A sign that the Tokyo Olympic Games failed to boost his ratings mainly due to an increase of coronavirus infections in Japan.
The banner here can be roughly translated as, “Stop the five rings.”
— Jonathan Ellis (@jonathanellis) July 23, 2021
The people of Japan had taken to the streets in late July to protest the stop to the Olympic games. Japan had recorded 1 million infections and over 15,700 deaths due to COVID-19. The main concern of the citizens was the spread of the new delta variant as it was the cause of the spike in the number of cases in recent weeks. The organizers had confirmed about 323 cases at the Olympics since the start of July.
Yesterday the world witnessed the closing ceremony of the Olympics. The International Olympic Committee chief Thomas Bach, who named the delay of the Olympic games “the most challenging Olympic journey”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has taken to Twitter to congratulate the Indian contingent for their brilliant and hard-fought success at the Olympics. He also mentioned and thanked the Government and the people of Japan for how they organised the events.
A special thank you to the Government and people of Japan, especially Tokyo for hosting the well-organised games.
To host it so successfully, in such times, gave out a strong message of resilience. It also demonstrated how sports is a great unifier. #Tokyo2020
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) August 8, 2021
