Taro Yamamoto, head of minor opposition party Reiwa Shinsengumi, said Thursday he will step down as leader after being fined for speeding in October. Voting in a leadership contest will be held on July 31.
Yamamoto told a press conference in Tokyo that he would resign as leader of Reiwa Shinsengumi and would not seek to return as a Diet lawmaker. The party said last week that Yamamoto was fined 90,000 yen with a 90-day license suspension for driving a rental car at 149 kilometers per hour on an expressway with an 80-kph limit in Oita Prefecture in October.
Yamamoto stood back from frontline politics in January to focus on treatment for multiple myeloma while remaining party leader on a reduced workload. The 51-year-old actor-turned-politician was first elected to the Diet in 2013 and founded the anti-establishment Reiwa Shinsengumi in 2019.
The party holds one seat in the House of Representatives, down from eight before the Feb. 8 election, and five seats in the upper house.
