TOKYO -- Japanese opposition parties submitted a motion of no-confidence against Farm Minister Tsutomu Takebe Monday accusing him of a string of blunders in handling the country's mad cow scare, AFP said. The motion against Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Tsutomu Takebe was tabled to Lower-House Secretary General Fukumaru Tani, said an official from the largest opposition Democratic Party of Japan. The DPJ submitted the motion jointly with the Liberal Party, Social Democratic Party of Japan and Communist Party. Since September, the government has confirmed three cases of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in Holstein dairy cows aged over five years old. "The dismissal of Minister Takebe is the minimum requirement and beginning for recovering the country's confidence on agricultural administration and settlement of the BSE problem," the motion said. The discovery of BSE cases "has widely spread distrust over the safety of the country's beef and other foods, causing tremendous (adverse) effects on producers, distributors, processors, retailers, restaurant owners and consumers," it said. "This situation was brought about by a serious blunder by the government and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries," it said, adding the authorities had insisted for years there was no danger of BSE in Japan. The European Union pointed to a high risk that the disease could be present in Japan in June last year, but they totally refused to accept the view, it said. The opposition camp also argued for Takebe's dismissal for his "outrageous remark" questioning the importance of nailing down the cause of the nation's mad cow disease. Takebe, who was appointed farm minister by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in April, came under fire in December for telling cattle farmers in Hokkaido, northern Japan: "I wonder if tracking down the infection source is such a big issue." The motion also rapped Takebe for "leaving untouched the hot bed for misconduct by Snow Brand Food Co. Ltd." The company has admitted to mislabelling imported beef as domestically produced to qualify for hundreds of thousands of dollars under a government subsidy program for those hit by the mad cow disease scare. It has yet to be decided when the house would vote on the resignation demand, but it is expected to be easily defeated by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's ruling coalition, which controls a majority of the house. But it could prove a further embarrassment for the premier in the wake of his controversial sacking of his popular foreign minister Makiko Tanaka on Tuesday. Koizumi's popularity has nosedived in snap opinion polls since he axed Tanaka seriously undermining his position, according to analysts. Ministry officials said Thursday the financial impact of Japan's mad cow scare for local farmers, retailers and restaurants would top an estimated 208 billion yen (1.5 billion dollars). BSE is linked to the fatal variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans which has killed about 100 people in Britain since the mid-1980s.