Global News Journal

Japan PM under fire — from his wife

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan faces plenty of grilling from the opposition camp but his toughest critic might be the one he calls “the opposition party within his own household” – his wife.

“Since I know him very well, I wonder — is it okay that this person is prime minister?” Nobuko Kan, Naoto’s wife of 40 years, writes in her new book titled “What on earth will change in Japan now you are prime minister?”

The 64-year-old Nobuko — who calls herself “Japan’s most nagging voter” — also reveals in the book that her husband is a terrible cook and has given up on studying English, and she pooh-poohs his fashion sense, describing how he once got caught walking around in public with a price tag sticking out of his sleeve.

Ouch.

“I am too scared to read it,” the prime minister, a 63-year-old former grassroots activist, admitted to reporters when asked about his wife’s book about their life together.

The book may not be the best way to cheer up her husband, whose support rate has been sliding since his ruling Democratic Party got clobbered in this month’s upper house election.  Kan faces a tough balancing act trying to rein in Japan’s huge debt while getting the wobbly economy back on track.

Japan voters seek change, may get chaos

Five years ago, Japanese voters seeking change from stale politics and a stagnant economy backed maverick leader Junichiro Koizumi’s calls for reform, handing his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) a huge win in an election for parliament’s powerful lower house.

Two years, several scandals and one incompetent prime minister later, they dealt the same LDP a stinging setback in a 2007  upper house election, creating a “Twisted Parliament” where the upper chamber could stall bills and delay policies.

The gridlock toppled the LDP’s Shinzo Abe and his successor,  each after about a year in office, and finally last summer the same electorate — still longing for something new and better — swept the novice Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) to power, ending more than half a century of almost non-stop LDP rule and ejecting  Taro Aso from the PM’s seat. The DPJ, voters hoped, would make good on promises to change how Japan was governed, ending bureaucratic control of policies, and somehow ensuring that Japan emerged from two decades of the doldrums.

Now, after less than a year  of chaotic policymaking,  indecisive leadership and more scandals under DPJ premier  Yukio Hatoyama, followed by sudden talk of a sales tax hike from former grassroots activist Naoto Kan, who took over when Hatoyama suddenly quit,  frustrated voters did it again.

On Sunday, they delivered a harsh rebuke to the DPJ and a tiny ally, depriving them of an upper house majority and setting the stage for another bout of deadlock as Japan struggles to engineer growth in a fast-ageing society and curb a gigantic public debt.

“Voters were not trying to create political confusion, but that is the result,” said independent political analyst Hirotaka Futatsuki, adding that calls for a snap lower house election that might not solve anything would grow. No lower house poll need be held until 2013.

Scenarios abound for possible ways out of the political bind.

Japan’s not-so-hot election

Candidates on the campaign trail in Japan are sweating through the summer heat but voters have been cool towards this Sunday’s upper house election.

Sure, the government won’t change because the ruling Democratic Party will still control the more powerful lower house.

But the election matters because failure for the Democrats to win a majority would split parliament and stall policymaking, blocking Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s pledge to cut Tokyo’s huge public debt, create jobs and fix the creaking social security system.

So why aren’t voters fired up? For one, the campaign has been pretty dull.

Rules require media to give equal coverage to all the political parties — not great for viewership when there are more than 10 of them. TV debates have had no fewer than seven party leaders arguing over issues ranging from the economy to diplomacy.

The debates are squeezed into shows lasting an hour or less, and include brief intervals showing pre-recorded comments from other party heads. Even Yasuo Tanaka, leader of New Party Nippon with just one seat in parliament, gets air time.

Japan PM gets face-time with Obama

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan, who took office earlier this month, hoped to impress voters as he made his debut at a meeting of G8 and G20 leaders in Canada last weekend, but saw media play at home overshadowed by the World Cup and a scandal roiling Japan’s traditional sport of sumo.

Still, Kan did manage to claim one prize from his summit debut – lots of face-time with U.S. President Barack Obama. Kan’s predecessor Yukio Hatoyama quit after just eight months in office in part because he botched up relations with Japan’s biggest ally over the relocation of a U.S. military base on Okinawa. So brief chats with Obama in between sessions, including one on Obama’s love for green tea ice cream, and a full, 30-minute meeting with the U.S. President at the end of his trip should comfort voters. An improvement from a mere 10 minutes Hatoyama was allotted when he met Obama at a nuclear safety summit in April.

Media were super-alert for Kan’s interaction with other leaders, too.  Kan appeared at ease as he talked to Russian Presdient Dmitry Medvedev on their way to an outdoor G8 leaders’ “family photo”. But after the photo, Kan was left standing outside a circle formed by other leaders as they chatted and laughed. “Go, elbow yourself in!” reporters cheered on as they watched footage broadcast into the media centre. But by the time Kan squeezed himself in, leaders had started to disperse and move on.

Japan’s new “voluntary militia” cabinet under PM Kan

When Japan’s top government spokesman, Yoshito Sengoku, was asked — as new Japanese leaders often are — to characterise the government’s new cabinet line-up, he fumbled a bit and then awkwardly said something about it being “fresh and hardworking.”

Doubtless hoping to come up with a zippier sobriquet, new Prime Minister Naoto Kan responded to a similar query a little later by comparing his 18-member cabinet to the “kiheitai” – a 19th century volunteer militia that played a key role in helping to topple Japan’s feudal overlord to open the door to the country’s modernisation.

The “kiheitai” were notable for breaking norms of the time by bringing together men of different social classes, including farmers . At a time when hereditary samurai warriors were usually the only ones joining such groups, the kiheitai chose its leaders based on their abilities rather than family status.

“The kiheitai was not a militia of the sons of feudal lords. People outside of the warrior class participated and made this group, just like the Democratic lawmakers who come from a wide range of people,” Kan said. “We need to courageously act to make a breakthrough from the current stagnating condition of Japan.”

Kan, a former grassroots activist whose father was an ordinary salaryman, may have hoped to capitalise not only on the colourful imagery of a militia fighting a worn-out established order but on Japanese voters’ resentment of the political dynasties that have produced many of his recent predecessors as premier, including the indecisive and unpopular Yukio Hatoyama, who quit office this month after just eight months in the job.

Critics say the dynastic tradition has been a big factor behind Japan’s lack of strong political leaders in the country because it floods the system with lawmakers of questionable ability and puts pressure on potential leaders who lack connections and riches to fund their campaigns.

“I am a son of a normal salaryman, and many of us are sons of salarymen or those running their own businesses. Democracy, by nature, should allow for young people who grew up in such regular families to have goals, work hard, and be able to flourish in the political world,” Kan said.