Japanese government gives final approval to postal privatization plan
The government gave green light Monday to a blueprint submitted earlier this year by Japan Post Corp. for privatizing the nation’s postal services.
It was the government’s final endorsement of the 10-year privatization process beginning on Oct. 1, when postal services will be split into four stock firms — savings, insurance, mail and over-the-counter services — under Japan Post, which will turn into their holding company.
The blueprint, submitted to the government in late April, includes the list of assets and employees Japan Post will take over from the public postal corporation that currently runs postal operations and some new enterprises planned for privatized entities.
Among such new business plans is letting the postal savings bank, which is one of the four planned entities, act as a sales agent for regional banks for their housing-loan products.
But the bank and life insurance industries voiced concerns the same day about the postal financial institutions expanding operations, saying they could threaten them.
Masayuki Oku, chairman of the Japanese Bankers Association, released a statement saying he regrets that the approved blueprint “fails to contain any specific plan for scaling down postal savings.”
“It means that (the planned savings bank) will expand operations while the government’s capital subscription in it is maintained,” he said.
Kunie Okamoto, chairman of the Life Insurance Association of Japan, called on the government in a statement to consider allowing the postal life insurance company to undertake new operations only after ensuring conditions for fair competition in the market.
