Name Miki Watanabe Role Member of Diet of Japan | Party Liberal Democratic Party | |
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Office Member of Diet of Japan since 2013 Similar People Eri Watanabe, Emperor Meiji, Hirohito, Akihito, Ryu Murakami Profiles | ||
Organizations founded WATAMI CO., LTD. | ||
Japanese School
Miki Watanabe (渡邉 美樹, Watanabe Miki, born October 5, 1959) is a Japanese entrepreneur and politician. He founded the Watami chain of izakaya restaurants and headed the company until 2011, when he resigned to run in the Tokyo gubernatorial election, 2011. Watanabe's run for the governorship of Tokyo was inspired by Michael Bloomberg's mayorship of New York City. Watanabe came in third with 16.8%, losing to incumbent governor Shintaro Ishihara.
He was elected to the House of Councillors representing the Liberal Democratic Party in the 2013 election. As of January 2014, he was the wealthiest member of the House of Councillors with reported personal assets of 1.76 billion yen. He is a member of the Committee on Economy and Industry, Committee on Oversight of Administration, Special Committee on Reconstruction after the Great East Japan earthquake, and Research Committee on Deflation-Ending Measures and Strengthening Public Finance for Nationals' Life.
The Watami group has faced criticism as a "black company" for its harsh treatment of employees, and was voted the worst company in Japan to work for in 2012 and 2013. The 2008 suicide of Mina Mori, a Watami employee who had worked 140 hours of overtime was ruled a case of karōshi (death from overwork) by the Kanagawa Prefecture Labor Standards Office, who also accused the company of numerous labor law violations. In December 2015 Watami reached an out-of-court settlement of 130 million yen with the family and Watanabe apologised.
Watanabe founded the School Aid Japan charity in 2001 to build schools and orphanages in Cambodia and Nepal.