Yoshiro Mori on Thursday decided to step down as head of the Tokyo Olympics organizing committee amid a furor at home and abroad over his recent discriminatory comments about women, Nikkei has learned.

The organizing committee has extended an offer to Saburo Kawabuchi, an 84-year-old former chairman of the Japan Football Association, to come aboard as the successor to Mori, 83. The ex-soccer player expressed to the committee his intention to accept it.

Mori on Thursday told broadcaster Nippon TV that he would "explain his thoughts" at a committee board meeting scheduled for Friday. While he did not confirm the reports that he would quit, he did say he "cannot let this problem prolong any longer."

Mori was reportedly planning to meet Kawabuchi on Thursday, apparently to ask him to take over.

The switch would come just five months before the scheduled start of the games in July, following their postponement last year due to the pandemic. The departure of a figure with broad connections in the political, business and sporting worlds is likely to affect preparations for the event.

Mori had said during a meeting of the Japanese Olympic Committee in Tokyo on Feb. 3 that board meetings with women "take so much time." Because of their "strong sense of competition," he said, "if one person raises their hand, others probably think, 'I need to say something, too.'"

The remarks came during a discussion of efforts to increase female representation on the committee's board.

Source: ANNnewsCH