Japan’s Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida has stated that Osaka’s integrated resort effort is “an important initiative in promoting a tourism-oriented country. We have been reviewing the certification by the established review committee, and have received reports that it is in the final stages”.

The statement, made this afternoon at the groundbreaking ceremony of EXPO 2025, in Yumeshima, “cannot be more direct in its inference that Osaka will be site for Japan’s first integrated resort which might be made official as early as tomorrow,” notes gaming analyst Daniel Cheng – author of Japan Casino Uprising.

Cheng points out that the Nippon Ishin political party’s “rapid rise helped accelerate the process amidst potential macro dynamics that they might replace Komeito as the LDP’s (Liberal Democratic Party) coalition partner in the next general election”.

In local elections over the weekend, Osaka’s incumbent governor Hirofumi Yoshimura defeated his rival, while in the mayoral runnings, Hideyuki Yokohama, defeated a former LDP Osaka city council member. Ishin also won a decisive gubernatorial fight in another Kansai prefecture, Nara.

The second batch of the unified local elections will happen on April 23rd and it is looking like the Komeito Party will come out the biggest loser out of these in the greater political scheme of things. And the big winner out of this political wind of change is the advancement of the first integrated resort in Japan.