Top bureaucrats face loss of power

THE ASAHI SHIMBUN

2009/7/28

NIIGATA--The main opposition party intends to rein in the power of senior bureaucrats if it wins the Aug. 30 Lower House election, says party leader Yukio Hatoyama.

Hatoyama, president of Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan), said in a speech here Sunday he would scrap twice-weekly meetings of administrative vice ministers, who hold the top bureaucratic posts at the various ministries and agencies.

That, he suggested, would strengthen political leadership by allowing the prime minister and his Cabinet members to make decisions on key policy issues.

In principle, vice ministers have met on Mondays and Thursdays to decide items to be approved at Cabinet meetings held the following day.

"We will reform the politics of bureaucrats, by bureaucrats, for bureaucrats to politics of the people, by the people, for the people," Hatoyama said in his speech on a street.

Hatoyama said the meetings of vice ministers essentially usurp ministerial authority with the result that "they have had bigger voices than the ministers themselves."

He said this situation must be corrected.

"It has been a big mistake that everything has to be decided in meetings of top bureaucrats," he added.

Still, within Minshuto, some members are concerned about doing away with the system altogether and calling for maintaining it on the condition the meetings coordinate certain tasks among ministries and agencies.(IHT/Asahi: July 28,2009)