A group of local residents said Thursday they will start raising money to buy the former family home of Empress Michiko to prevent it from being torn down by the government this month.
The house in Shinagawa Ward, Tokyo, was offered to the government after the Empress' father, Hidesaburo Shoda, died in June 1999, in lieu of an inheritance tax payment.
The Finance Ministry has rejected calls from local residents to preserve the house, saying that the bidding to select firms to do the demolition work was carried out on Friday, and that it will carry out its plans to tear down the house and auction off the land as planned.