Japanese Prime Minister on the cockroach 'eliminated' in her home: 'I felt sad'
Japan's leader Sanae Takaichi is used to working long hours alone in her official residence, but a nightly encounter with a cockroach disrupted her routine. After she refused to kill it due to her beliefs, her aides intervened and destroyed it. She admitted: 'I felt relieved, but at the same time a little lonely and even sad.'
The official residence of Japan's prime ministers in Tokyo has been known for decades as a breeding ground for rumors and urban legends about ghosts of figures killed there during coup attempts in the 30s. But now, 65-year-old Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi shares that the truly frightening encounter she experienced in the house's corridors was not with a figure from the past - but with a cockroach.
In an unusual post she published on her X account, where she occasionally answers common questions from the public, Takaichi addressed the rumors: "I get a lot of questions like: 'Have you already met the ghosts that gained fame in the official residence?' - so far, I haven't met any ghost yet." The Prime Minister replied that while she hasn't seen any lost souls, she did see a disturbing insect: "Instead, I met a cockroach."
Takaichi said that despite the nuisance, she was unable to kill it and hoped it would leave on its own: "Maybe because in my childhood I read Osamu Tezuka's 'Phoenix', to this day I am unable to kill insects, including cockroaches. I probably thought to myself: 'Maybe this life is also part of the same long cycle of reincarnation'."
'Elimination operation' in the residence corridors
The unexpected idyll between Japan's leader and the insect came to a quick end the moment the residence staff discovered what was happening. "For a while I just tolerated it, hoping it would somehow leave on its own - but when I told my secretaries about it, they were absolutely horrified," Takaichi recalled.
"It's not hygienic. I'll take care of it," one of the secretaries said decisively, and organized an "elimination operation."
The staff's thorough treatment worked, and the cockroaches disappeared as if they never existed. But surprisingly, the Prime Minister's feeling afterwards was complex: "Since then I haven't seen any more cockroaches. I felt relieved, but at the same time a little lonely, and maybe even sad..." she admitted, which drew many reactions online, some expressing compassion for the loneliness, and some of course laughing.
Secluding herself for work: 'Reduce the burden on security'
Within just 10 months of her tenure, the workaholic Prime Minister of Japan has competed with world leaders and boasted that she survives on three hours of sleep a night.
The cockroach story came after another post Takaichi published, in which she responded to reports that she is "reclusive" and "lonely," and explained why she chooses to work from the official residence adjacent to her office. According to her, working from the residence allows her to streamline her time and reduce the burden on the security team and staff members: "Working from the residence allows me to minimize the number of staff and security personnel, including the Special Police, who need to be involved at any given moment. This way, it is possible to reduce the burden on staff and security personnel on weekdays and maximize efficiency."
Takaichi concluded and clarified that this is not about evading her obligations: "Although the Prime Minister's residence is known as a 'home', it also has a solid and central function as a space for holding meetings and fulfilling official duties."
