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KOIZUMI
ON THE HUSTINGS
Mad cows and LDP
politics
By Richard Hanson
In this series: Politics in the paddies
TOKYO - Cows don't vote. But if they did,
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, leader of the
ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), wouldn't be so
cock-sure of winning the general election of the
powerful Lower House - the Diet - which he called to
take place on November 9.
Just as Koizumi was
moving to dissolve the Lower House, Japan discovered its
eighth case of mad-cow disease, an affliction that can
be fatal if spread to people. The first case was found
in September 2001. Also known as bovine spongiform
encephalopathy (BSE), an afflicted Holstein, a breed of
black-and-white dairy cow, was found through testing at
a slaughterhouse to the north of Tokyo.
This time,
there are indications that the BSE that was found is
a new form of the disease that (before Japan's first
case) was focused on Europe. It looks similar to a
strain that killed a couple cows in Italy, which could
mean the animal ate a form of meal that carried this
disease and was banned two years ago.
Here's the
rub. The unfortunate 23-month-old animal left its
hoofprints in a total of three electoral districts in
the Kanto region, in which the LDP's "farm lobby" is
strong, but where its candidates are to be considered on
shaky ground. On the eve of an election, the last thing
the LDP needs is a farm scandal, which is possible if it
turns out farmers, protected by the LDP, were feeding
the animal banned meal.
Not to worry. The
government can just keep the cow safely out of view by
ordering it to be "studied" until further notice, or at
least until the election is over.
Koizumi does
not want a bad-cow dream to muck up what has been so far
a shrewdly masterminded strategy to solidify his place
as the LDP's undisputed strongman. In September, the
prime minister slaughtered all other challengers in the
LDP's presidential election. All he needs now is to win
outright for his party on November 9.
That
scenario, bar any catastrophes, will win him a lock on
the Prime Minister's Office for three more years. For
the party, the agenda is clearly to gain a follow-up
victory next summer when an Upper House election is
mandated to be held.
A clear win would mean a
return to one-party LDP rule, blotting out a decade in
which the party briefly (eight months in 1993-94) lost
control and was then obliged to share power in
coalitions, at the moment including the New Komeito and
the New Conservative parties to provide the Upper House
majority. The cost is cheap; a couple cabinet posts. (In
the old days, the LDP would simply buy out "independent"
politicians to fill out any electoral shortfall.)
However, there is one big problem with this
scenario: Voters may not buy it, and here's why. For the
past few weeks, all attention was focused on how
skillfully Koizumi skirted the power of the personal
factions that have long dominated the LDP, which, in all
truth, derives much of its strength from being
faction-ridden. In place of these factions, Koizumi's
strategy was and is to offer himself up. The LDP's
election platform - a milquetoast bowl of pledges -
shouts out: "Koizumi".
Yet, as one Japanese
reporter asks: "What exactly is meant by 'We've made
it'?" If voters are going to pay attention to what
Koizumi has actually achieved in the past couple years
as prime minister, they will find that most of his
policy ambitions on the reform front have been thwarted
by opposition within the LDP. What remain are
watered-down platitudes. Even Koizumi's showpiece battle
to reform and privatize the postal system has become
vaguer. And this is the issue he said last year he would
"crush" the party over.
Some of the other
pledges put out by the LDP include:
Submitting bills in 2004 to privatize road-related
quasi-governmental corporations.
Drafting reforms for the public pension fund system
by the end of the year.
Realizing economic growth of 2 percent a year by
fiscal 2006 (read 2007, but only as a national budgetary
calculation).
Improving public safety by such means as cutting in
half the number of illegal foreigners without proper
visas within five years.
These may coddle some
people within the LDP, but they are not the sort of
grand visions for change and reform that drew the public
to Koizumi when he was first elected president of the
LDP and hence prime minister in April 2001. Those were
the days when he was novel enough to attract large
numbers of fans (women, in particular) as much for his
dashing looks and bold statements as for his catch-all
championing of radical "structural reform" in Japan,
including the government and economy.
At the
moment, Koizumi is benefiting from some welcome
improvement in the economy, though its hard to pinpoint
this upturn to anything other than reasonably stable
rule (that is staying in office, no scandals) to his
credit.
Koizumi has in the past two years helped
stabilized Japan's security and diplomatic relations
with the United States and in the region at a time when
tensions have been high. His breakthrough in initiating
normalization talks with North Korea in September 2002
have produced mixed reviews, but domestic support for
his initiative remains strong. His surprise choice of
the youthful Shinzo Abe as LDP secretary general, to
lead the election battle, was applauded, in large part,
because of Abe's tough stance on North Korea's treatment
of kidnapped Japanese. (This week marks the first
anniversary of the return to Japan of a small group of
those who were kidnapped as long as two decades ago.)
In the LDP's favor, many Japanese voters find it
rather difficult to judge the differences between
Koizumi's policies and those of the largest opposition
party, the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), which is
lead by Naoto Kan. In Kan's favor, he is at least as
photogenic as (and much more articulate than) Koizumi.
The problem is that there is little in the way
of substantial policy differences. The chief difference
is over the issue of sending Japanese Self Defense
Forces to Iraq to help in reconstruction of that
country. Kan has not yet used the issue effectively.
Koizumi has already indicated that he will
support the aims of the his strong "ally" US President
George W Bush by providing about US$1.5 billion to
international efforts to rebuild Iraq. Bush will pay a
short visit to Japan this week, his second time in Japan
since taking the presidency. (During a trip in February
2002, Bush made a great fuss of praising Koizumi, whose
star quality had suffered greatly at the time after
firing a popular female foreign minister, Makiko Tanaka,
who is running for the seat she quit in a scandal last
year.)
Koizumi still draws high ratings for his
cabinet, which was formed at the end of September after
his re-election to the party presidency. According to
the latest poll by NHK, the national broadcasting
network, about 62 percent of those polled approved, up 1
percentage point from last month. They cited Koizumi as
the only option in sight.
Then last Friday, when
the Diet was dissolved, a snap poll on political parties
by Kyodo News and Yahoo Japan Corp found a surprising
lead in support for the Democratic Party of Japan, 61
percent, versus only 19 percent for the Liberal
Democratic Party. What that indicates about the upcoming
election is anyone's guess.
But back to the
problem of mad-cow disease. What experts on the subject
say is that the government, especially under pressure
from the farm lobby within the LDP, had from the first
discovery of the disease in Japan tried to down play the
serious nature of the problem - it is fatal for infected
people - at a possible risk to the public. It was only
after a strong reaction from the public that the
government initiated a policy of testing all beef cows
that are brought to slaughter - making Japan the only
country that does so.
Now Koizumi and the LDP
may again be fooling themselves if they pursue an
election strategy that assumes they can avoid a credible
agenda - putting it off for further "study" - while
national illnesses are neglected may not work. Voters,
unlike cows, do vote.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times
Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
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