Yokohama – Seven people have filed their candidacies in Yokohama’s mayoral election, including scandal-hit former Mayor Takeharu Yamanaka, with the two-week official campaign period kicking off Sunday. Yamanaka’s fate is in focus ahead of the Oct. 18 poll, which will be held after he resigned last month in the middle of his second term after an investigative committee determined he harassed senior municipal officials. The other six candidates are civic group representative Sachiko Fujikawa, 51, former lawmaker Kazuma Nakatani, 43, lawyer Atsumi Harasawa, 59, company manager Atsushi Fukuyama, 37, architect Riken Yamamoto, 81, and Yuka Asaka, 46, deputy leader of the Japanese Communist Party’s Kanagawa prefectural branch.
Nakatani is backed by the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan’s prefectural chapter, while Harasawa is endorsed by the prefectural chapters of the Liberal Democratic Party, the Democratic Party for the People and the Japan Innovation Party, as well as by Komeito’s city assembly members. Fukuyama is endorsed by Sanseito. Meanwhile, Nakatani promised to “open up city administration for a future filled with hopes.” “I’ll bring back smiles to city government employees so residents can also smile,” Harasawa said.
He was re-elected in 2025 with support from local organizations of the LDP, Komeito and the CDP. In July this year, a third-party investigation confirmed instances of harassment, leading him to resign.
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