Licence plates 'too cute' for Japanese motorcyclists

HIMEJI, Hyogo (THE DAILY YOMIURI/ASIA NEWS NETWORK) -The Himeji municipal government is reintroducing regular licence plates after receiving a number of complaints from male motorcyclists following its introduction of mandatory licence plates featuring the city's mascot.

The local government adopted the licence plates featuring the city's image character "Shiromaruhime" to promote the city, but decided to revive ordinary licence plates from Nov 15.

Shiromaruhime is a round-faced "princess" with a castle on top of her head and a flowery hair accessory.

Although many local governments have their own unique licence plates, they give people the option of using ordinary ones. However, as motorists in Himeji were not given this option for motorcycles, a number of them complained.