Japan headed for further political confusion: analysts
By Linda Sieg
TOKYO: A failed attempt by Japan’s prime minister to form a grand coalition with the main opposition party and break a deadlock in parliament has set the country on track for more political confusion and policy gridlock, analysts say.
Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda sounded out Democratic Party leader Ichiro Ozawa about forming a new ruling coalition in a meeting on Friday, but the opposition swiftly rejected the offer.
“The meeting has made things more fluid. Anything can happen. We are entering a period of tremendous political upheaval,” said Sophia University political science professor Koichi Nakano.
“We are basically back to gridlock, with an even greater degree of political uncertainty.”
Fukuda said on Friday that he had suggested a new political framework to Ozawa to resolve the policy stalemate created when the ruling camp lost a July upper house election, allowing the opposition to delay key legislation.
Topping the list of bills Fukuda wants to enact is one to enable Japan’s navy to resume a refueling mission in support of US-led operations in Afghanistan, activities close ally Washington says are vital to its fight against terrorism.
Tokyo recalled its ships on Thursday when a law enabling the mission expired. Ozawa has said the mission lacked a UN mandate and violated Japan’s pacifist constitution, and the Democrats and their allies have vowed to vote against the new bill.
Japan’s refueling operations for US and other ships patrolling the Indian Ocean are expected to be halted for months if not longer -- something Fukuda must explain to US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates when he visits Tokyo this week and to President George Bush in talks in Washington the week after.
Fukuda’s ruling bloc could now decide to use its two-thirds majority in the lower house to override an upper house rejection of the bill now that the Democrats rejected his offer.
So far, lawmakers in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its junior coalition partner have been wary of taking that step for fear it would anger voters, who are divided over the mission.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura, however, on Sunday stopped short of making that threat.
“That is still a matter for the future,” Machimura told public broadcaster NHK.
Machimura also denied the possibility of a snap poll for the powerful lower house, speculation about which has been swirling ever since the ruling bloc lost its upper house majority.
“Dissolving parliament is not something we are thinking about even in the furthest reaches of our minds,” he told NHK.
No election for the powerful lower house need be held until late 2009, but pundits have been predicting an early poll, most likely next April but perhaps even as early as January.
The current session of parliament, set to end on Nov 10, is now likely to be extended for about one month, media reported.
OZAWA DAMAGED: Fuku-da’s courtship of the Democrats could well be seen as a sign of weakness by the prime minister, whose month-old government has failed to enact a single bill, analysts said.
But media reports on Sunday that it was Ozawa who made the offer first, without consulting Democratic Party executives, mean his credibility could be damaged even more.
Ozawa had offered to resign, Kyodo reported later, citing an unidentified senior member of his party. It said party executives were trying to persuade him not to step down from the top post.
Ozawa has made creating a viable alternative to the long-ruling LDP a top goal ever since he bolted the party in 1993, and many had thought the Democrats had their best chance ever of taking power in the next election.
“Both sides are blaming the other for taking the initiative and that mudslinging will go on,” Nakano said.
“But in many ways, Ozawa’s credibility is more damaged and the Democratic Party seems badly shaken.”
Ozawa, 65, has a reputation as an autocrat and backroom dealer, and the tete-a-tetes with Fukuda — the pair met twice last week — have hardly dispelled that image.
Analysts said the Democratic Party — an often fractious amalgam of former LDP members, ex-Socialists and hawkish younger lawmakers — was now in danger of greater disarray.
“For now, everyone is just trying to keep the party together,” said Yasunori Sone, a political science professor at Keio University.—Reuters
