TOKYO - Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro
Koizumi's new cabinet provides some clues as to
who the front-runners are to replace the popular
premier when he steps down in September next year.
Koizumi, whose term as president of the
ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) - and
thereby as prime minister - is to expire in less
than a year, formed what may be his last cabinet
on Monday night. Earlier in the day he also
reshaped the top LDP leadership. He said
previously he would appoint people with potential
to be the next prime minister to key posts in his
new cabinet and LDP leadership so as to further
promote his reforms.
Prior to naming the
cabinet, the focus had been on what posts would be
given to the four LDP members Koizumi has
indicated are in the running to succeed him -
acting LDP secretary general
Shinzo Abe, Finance Minister
Sadakazu Tanigaki, Internal Affairs and
Communications Minister Taro Aso, and the former
chief cabinet secretary, Yasuo Fukuda.
Abe, a soft-spoken political blue-blood,
was appointed chief cabinet secretary, his first
cabinet appointment. Aso was named foreign
minister and Tanigaki was retained as finance
minister. Unexpectedly, Fukuda, known for his
pro-China stance and criticism of Koizumi's
Yasukuni war shrine visits, was left out of the
cabinet, possibly dealing a blow to his
aspirations to move into the prime minister's
office. Still, it is too early to count him out.
Abe, the most popular of potential
successors, appears to have further boosted his
prospects. Meanwhile, the appointment of two
foreign-policy hawks and leading conservatives -
Abe and Aso - to key posts are expected to raise
fresh concerns among Japan's neighbors, especially
China and South Korea.
Japan's relations
with the two remain chilly due to Koizumi's
repeated visits to the war-related Yasukuni shrine
and other issues. Abe is a critic of China. His
grandfather, the former prime minister, Nobusuke
Kishi, was a member of the wartime cabinet of then
prime minister, Hideki Tojo. Kishi was arrested by
the occupation forces as a suspected war criminal,
although he was never indicted.
Among
other changes, Heizo Takenaka, minister in charge
of economic and fiscal policy and postal
privatization, was named internal affairs and
communications minister. He will continue to be
responsible for postal privatization. The LDP's
policy-research chairman, Kaoru Yosano, took over
from Takenaka as minister in charge of economic
and fiscal policy and financial services.
Shoichi Nakagawa, economy, trade and
industry minister, was given the post of
agriculture minister. The post of economy, trade
and industry minister went to Toshihiro Nikai, the
LDP's general affairs bureau chief. Yuriko Koike
was retained as environment minister. Fukushiro
Nukaga, a former defense agency chief, was
appointed to the portfolio again. Jiro Kawasaki,
former transport minister, was named health, labor
and welfare minister. Kuniko Inoguchi, one of
"Koizumi's children" loyal to the prime minister,
was named minister in charge of gender equality
and measures against declining birth rates.
Land, Infrastructure and Transport
Minister Kazuo Kitagawa, the only cabinet member
from the LDP's junior coalition partner, New
Komeito, was retained at New Komeito's request. As
for the top LDP posts, Koizumi retained LDP
secretary general Tsutomu Takebe and executive
council chairman Fumio Kyuma. He replaced policy
research council chairman Yosano with Hidenao
Nakagawa, a close aid to the premier and the LDP's
parliamentary affairs committee chairman.
In addition to the main four, Nakagawa,
Koike and Takenaka are mentioned as possible
future prime ministerial candidates.
Usually, prime ministers waste no time
forming their cabinets or shaking them up
immediately after general elections. But Koizumi
had delayed the cabinet shuffle after the
September 11 Lower House poll, giving top priority
to pushing his postal reform bills, the
centerpiece of his reform drive, through the diet,
Japan's parliament. The bills were enacted
October14 in a special diet session, which
concluded Tuesday.
Unlike Koizumi's
previous cabinet and LDP leadership decisions,
there was no big surprise appointment in Monday's
shuffle - other than the absence of Fukuda, an
indication the prime minister named only
loyalists.
"I've placed the right people
in the right places," he told a news conference
after the formal launch of his new cabinet. He
described his administration as "a cabinet to
carry on reforms".
Aesthetics or
Machiavellism? Koizumi's power base within
the LDP has been strengthened significantly since
the September 11 general election. He took a
political gamble by dissolving the Lower House in
early August, after the postal privatization bills
were voted down by the Upper House. Although
Koizumi's LDP and coalition partner hold a
majority in the Upper House, a larger number of
LDP lawmakers than the party leadership had
expected voted against the bills.
Koizumi
cannot dissolve the Upper House, so he called a
snap general election for the Lower House to seek
a new mandate for reform programs, especially his
pet project to privatize Japan Post, effectively
the world's largest financial institution with
about US$3 trillion in assets.
His gamble
paid off, with the LDP winning a landslide
victory, capturing 296 seats in the 480-member
Lower House. The LDP on Friday announced
punishments for the rebellious lawmakers who voted
against the postal bills. The party expelled the
former agriculture minister, Hosei Norota, and
told 27 others, including Seiko Noda, the former
telecommunications minister, to leave the party.
Meanwhile, speculation that Koizumi's term
as LDP president might be extended beyond
September grew after the LDP victory. But he has
flatly rejected such a possibility.
Many
LDP lawmakers and political commentators agree
that stepping down gracefully without trying to
hold onto power is Koizumi's style. But some
believe that he wants to stand down when he has
enough power to handpick his successor, rather
than trying to do so after being reduced to a lame
duck.
Post-postal reform
agenda Before Monday's cabinet shuffle,
Koizumi indicated he would let his potential
successors compete for reform. His implicit
message to them is: only a real and fully tested
reformer is qualified to follow in his footsteps.
In announcing the new lineup, Abe, as new
chief cabinet secretary, noted that the new
cabinet members were experts in areas they had
been appointed to oversee. "The new Koizumi
cabinet is a business-first one. The direction of
reform programs has already been set, and each
minister will strive to implement them
steadfastly."
Three reforms have emerged
as top-priority tasks on the agenda -
consolidation or even abolition of
government-affiliated financial institutions,
reduction in the bloated number of central and
local government employees, and the so-called
triune reform of local
government finances.
The ultimate goal of these reforms is to
make the central government leaner and more
efficient amid the ballooning budget deficit.
Japan's fiscal condition is already the worst
among major industrialized economies. The total
deficits held by the central and local governments
are expected to reach about 774 trillion yen at
the end of fiscal 2005.
Koizumi has vowed he would not
raise the current 5% consumption tax rate while in
office. But whoever becomes his successor will
certainly have to grapple squarely with the
unpopular and politically risky task of hiking the
tax. The LDP pledged in a manifesto - or campaign
platform - to make a sweeping reform of the tax
system, including the consumption tax.
As a
result, those being considered to take over the
ministries primarily in charge of the three
reforms are being closely watched. The Finance Ministry and the Ministry of
Economy, Trade and Industry are primarily
responsible for reform of government-affiliated
banks, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs and
Communications looks after reform of the
civil-servant system, as well as being primarily
responsible, along with the Finance Ministry, for
reform of local government finances.
In
addition to these three posts, the health, labor
and welfare minister's job is seen as more
important than ever before as it entails
rehabilitating the creaking social-security
system, including pension, medical insurance and
nursing-care insurance for the elderly - a
pressing task for a government facing a rapidly
aging society and declining birth rates.
The post of chief cabinet secretary is
also important because its holder, often dubbed
the "wife of a prime minister", is tasked with
coordinating government policies involving
multiple ministries and agencies.
Although reform plans for
government-affiliated financial institutions have
been broached many times in the past, they all
ended up being shelved due to resistance from
ministries, agencies and lawmakers
concerned.
The
aim of the postal-reform campaign is to ensure
massive funds circulate within the private-sector
economy to revitalize the nation's economy as a
whole, while also restoring fiscal
discipline.
The so-called
triune reform of local government finances
includes cuts in subsidies to local governments,
transfer of tax-revenue sources to local
governments and reform of tax grants to local
governments to make up for shortfalls in fiscal
revenue. The need for reductions in the number of
government employees and resulting personnel costs
as part of efforts to make the government leaner
and more efficient has grown with the prospect of
the nation's population beginning to decline as
early as this year. The total number of central
and local government employees is about 4 million.
Differences over Yasukuni On the
foreign-policy front, the new Koizumi cabinet
faces a daunting task of repairing strained
relations with China and South Korea. Japan's ties
with these countries have been at their lowest
points in recent years due to Koizumi's repeated
visits to Yasukuni, territorial disputes and
Japanese school textbooks authored by rightwing
scholars. Japan and China are also locked in a
simmering dispute over Chinese natural gas
projects in the disputed waters in the East China
Sea.
The four leading candidates to
succeed Koizumi take differing stances on the
Yasukuni issue. Abe and Aso are steadfast backers
of Koizumi's visits, while Fukuda and Tanigaki are
widely seen as being critical of, or at least
skeptical, about the visits, although the two have
refrained from speaking their minds publicly.
After Koizumi's October 17 visit to the
shrine, Abe said in a statement that it is
"natural" for him to visit as a leader, to pay
tribute to those who sacrificed their lives for
the nation. "Whoever becomes prime minister should
fulfill that responsibility." Abe also said on
Monday after being appointed as chief cabinet
secretary that he wanted to continue his visits to
the Shinto shrine. "As an individual and
politician I have visited the shrine. I want to
continue to maintain the feelings that I have had
until now."
Abe serves as an adviser to a
group of junior and middle-ranking LDP lawmakers
from various party factions supporting Koizumi's
Yasukuni visits. This group is also beginning to
take on the character of a cheer group for Abe in
the party presidential and prime ministerial
succession race.
In an August interview
with monthly magazine Bungei Shunju, Aso said,
"Naturally Prime Minister Koizumi should [continue
to] visit Yasukuni shrine. Successive prime
ministers visited there. Even Christian Mr
Masayoshi Ohira went there." Asked if he would
visit the shrine as prime minister, Aso replied he
would. "Whatever China and South Korea say, we
should behave as if nothing happened. The most
ideal way of resolving the Yasukuni dispute is
that it works out peacefully after they realize
that it is useless for them to complain anymore."
Meanwhile, Fukuda is known as a pro-China
politician. Fukuda is a proponent of establishing
a state-run, non-religious facility as an
alternative to Yasukuni shrine. The LDP's
coalition partner, the New Komeito party, is
strongly pushing for the alternative facility.
Fukuda is popular among rank-and-file members of
New Komeito.
Asked after Koizumi's last
visit whether he would visit Yasukuni as prime
minister, Tanigaki said he "cannot answer that
assumptive question". But he acknowledged later at
a lecture that he would not visit the shrine as
premier. "It would be difficult as long as Class-A
war criminals are enshrined there."
Hisane Masaki is a Tokyo-based
journalist, commentator and scholar on
international politics and economy. Masaki's
e-mail address is yiu45535@nifty.com
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