TOKYO - Japan's new Prime Minister Taro Aso is armed with little more personal
charisma as he leads the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) into elections
which will sorely test the conservative party's 50-year grip on power.
"It now appears certain that Aso will immediately dissolve the Diet
[parliament] and call for general elections," Professor Tomohiko Taniguchi at
the Keio University told Inter Press Service. ''Poll after poll shows he's been
the most popular LDP politician. You could say that he bears the responsibility
of using that popularity to get maximum support from the voters.''
Aso's selection as prime minister was assured after the Lower House voted in
his favor on Wednesday. Although the less
powerful Upper House voted for Ichiro Ozawa, leader of the opposition
Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ).
An outspoken conservative, Aso does not hide his distaste for communism and
supports a firm United States-Japan alliance. But what distinguishes him from
other hawks in the LDP is his pragmatic approach and his disarming smile.
Before he calls elections, Aso must overcome the legacy of being Japan's third
prime minister in two years. Frustrated by the DPJ blocking key legislation,
including an anti-terrorism bill, his predecessors Yasuo Fukuda and Shinzo Abe
simply threw in the towel.
"Fukuda chose to step down, fully aware that he could not carry the general
election due to his declining popularity and job approval rating," Taniguchi
said. "In order for the LDP to remain in power, someone more popular in the
eyes of the public needs to lead the party and face off the challenges from the
opposition DPJ."
There is, according to surveys, a fair chance that the LDP, even under Aso,
could get defeated by the DPJ. Under Ozawa the DPJ led the opposition to
victory in the Upper House, last year, when the government became embroiled in
a scandal over mismanaged pension records.
''We must fight against the DPJ in the next general election,'' Aso told
reporters immediately after his landslide victory in elections for the LDP
presidency. ''It is by winning that battle that I can fulfill my task.''
Aso needs to not only win but also to bag enough seats to be able to override
legislative vetoes by the DPJ and avoid the gridlock that plagued his
predecessors.
Aso must also continue the work of mending relations with China, soured during
the tenure of Junichiro Koizumi. This is not helped by the fact that he once
described Japan's giant neighbor as a ''major threat''.
In particular, there is the Yasukuni Shrine issue. While foreign minister Aso
chose not to visit the shrine, where executed war criminals are honored. China,
South Korea and other neighboring countries regard the shrine, and visits to
it, as glorifying Japan's militaristic past.
Weston Konishi, adjunct fellow with the Mansfield Foundation, said, "Aso's
right-wing credentials aside, it would be a mistake for him to visit Yasukuni
in his official capacity as prime minister. That would rupture the implicit
agreement, reached by Abe, to resist visiting it in exchange for greater
forbearance from China. My guess is that Aso has the good sense not to visit
the shrine and trigger a new round of tension with Beijing."
Mainstream Japanese media must not touch the Aso family's own war record of
using forced labor, drawn of allied prisoners of war, at its mines. Aso has
refused to apologize for it, saying he was only five years old when the war
ended and cannot be held responsible.
"The forced labor episode is an embarrassing chapter in the Aso family legacy,
and one that Aso and his supporters would rather not bring out into the open if
they can help it," said Konishi. "Aso will want to strengthen Japan's
diplomatic ties and that effort could be complicated if the forced labor
episode flares up. So it is in Aso's best interest to keep the issue quiet.''
Just where Aso stands on foreign policy can be gauged from a suggestion he made
two years ago that it was time Japan began a debate on whether or not to
acquire nuclear weapons.
But the new prime minister's most daunting challenge will be to revive the
flagging economy and address the effects of the global financial turmoil. Some
attribute the worsening situation in the agro-centric rural areas to reforms
under Koizumi, especially the draconian cutting of large-scale public works
projects which had created job opportunities.
"The crux of the problem lies in the fact that you now have a declining input
into the economy, as you have a declining population, and the growth in
productivity has not caught up,'' Taniguchi said.
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