Prime Minister Fukuda Resigns
At this very moment (about 9:35 p.m. Japan Time on Monday, September 1st), Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda is announcing his resignation, interrupting evening television broadcasts. Apparently, he decided to resign last week, feeling it better to step aside prior to the September 12th start of the extraordinary Diet session so as not to cause trouble.
Fukuda said he thought he had laid the groundwork for the next Prime Minister to make progress on the issues he wanted to address, but was unable to completely resolve. He assured the TV audience and press corps that he understood the problems and complaints of the people and strove to do what was best.
So far, the pundits agree that Fukuda had been boxed in by not only the opposition camp, but also the LDP’s coalition partners, who blocked most of his initiatives and showed no sign of making the coming extraordinary Diet session any more friendly than the recent ordinary Diet session or last year’s extraordinary session. For his troubles, Fukuda earned only the disapproval of the citizenry.
As of today, Fukuda’s approval rating stood at 29% - a nine point drop from its high just after the recent Cabinet reshuffle, but, unfortunately for him, one of the higher points for that measure this year. Disapproval was at 63%, an increase of 14 points.
At this point, the question is whether, or by how much, the impending LDP Presidential election will delay a general election (a question that takes us into speculation built on speculation.) Fukuda’s resignation doesn’t change the fact that there still must me a general election no later than September 2009.
With the coming election of a new LDP President and, hence, a new Prime Minister, a Special Session of the Diet will have to be convened. Whether this Special Session will supplant, be subsumed by, or be added onto the already planned Extraordinary Session, I’m trying to find out at the moment. If the latter, Fukuda’s resignation might have been very well-timed indeed. The lenghtened session could even act as a sort of punishment to New Komeito for its lack of loyalty. A longer session would also allow for the fifty-nining of at least one or two of the contentious, deadlock-inducing measures due to face the Diet this Fall, not least of which would be the Indian Ocean refueling mission, up for renewal again, which US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recently urged Japan to continue on her visit here.
It would be kind of any readers who can set me straight on the above to comment below.
More to come in the next TPR News.
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