Preceded by Yoshitsugu Kunimatsu Succeeded by Taizo Mikazuki | Name Yukiko Kada Party Tomorrow Party of Japan | |
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Full Name Yukiko Watanabe (渡辺 由紀子) Born May 18, 1950 (age 73)
Honjo, Japan ( 1950-05-18 ) Political party Tomorrow Party of Japan
(2012-2013) Alma mater Kyoto University
University of Wisconsin Education Kyoto University, University of Wisconsin-Madison | ||
Shiga governor yukiko kada teaches the goshu ondo dance
Yukiko Kada (嘉田 由紀子, Kada Yukiko, born May 18, 1950) is a former governor of Shiga Prefecture. She is from Honjō, Saitama and her father was a member of the city council. She went to Kyoto University and studied environmental sociology. She moved to Ōtsu, Shiga in 1979. She graduated from the Graduate School of Agriculture of Kyoto University in 1981. She also studied in the United States at the University of Wisconsin as a graduate student in 1973. She became a professor at Kyoto Seika University in 2000.
She was first elected in 2006, defeating incumbent governor Yoshitsugu Kunimatsu. She became the first female governor of Shiga and only the fifth female governor in Japanese history. She then enjoyed a landslide re-election victory in 2010. Behind her popular campaign slogan mottainai (translating roughly to "Don't Waste"), Gov. Kada captured 420,000 votes, which was the largest total of any in the history of Shiga Prefecture's gubernatorial elections. She was supported by the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and led the Tomorrow Party of Japan (TPJ), which was founded shortly before the 2012 general election. The TPJ performed poorly in the election and all of its diet members except for Tomoko Abe left the party shortly afterwards, leading to the loss of its status as a national party. National party status in Japan requires five sitting diet members.
After the Shiga prefectural assembly passed a resolution requesting Kada to stop doubling as governor and the head of the TPJ, she resigned as head of the party on January 4, 2013.
In May 2014 Kada published a release on her official website stating her intention not to contest the election scheduled for July of that year. She was succeeded as governor by Taizō Mikazuki.