Kentarō Genma

Kentaro Genma is the kind of politician whose backstory makes you do a double-take. The son of a family salted-fish business in Shizuoka, he somehow ended up in Cambodia dismantling small arms under a Japanese foreign aid program before most of his peers had even figured out their career path. That detour through post-conflict Southeast Asia, followed by a graduate degree in international peace and conflict resolution in Washington D.C., is not the usual route to a seat in the Japanese Diet — and honestly that's what makes him interesting. He came up through the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management, which has produced a disproportionate share of Japan's reform-minded politicians, won his Shizuoka district in 2017, lost his footing for a cycle, then came back in October 2024 under the Constitutional Democratic Party banner. I get the sense he's one of those legislators who actually did the fieldwork before the speechmaking, which in a chamber full of dynastic heirs is refreshingly unusual.

Kentarō Genma is a Japanese politician born on December 21, 1972, in Nishi Ward, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. He graduated from Seikei University. Further personal details, including his agency affiliation and career timeline, are not publicly disclosed.

Name (English)

Kentarō Genma

Name (Japanese)

源馬謙太郎

Reading

げんま けんたろう

Born

December 21, 1972 (age 53)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Sagittarius / Rat

Origin

Nishi Ward, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan

Occupation

Politician

University

Seikei University

Motto

Private

• Official sitehttp://gemma-kentaro.com/
• Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/gemmakentaro/
• Xhttps://x.com/gemmakentaro
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%BA%90%E9%A6%AC%E8%AC%99%E5%A4%AA%E9%83%8E

Tags

• From Shizuoka Prefecture
• Politician

Last updated

2026-06-02

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.