Akitoshi Muraoka
Although it was established less than two months ago, the administration of Prime Minister Naoto Kan is already showing signs that it may be approaching its end.
Looking back at previous administrations, certain characteristics are constants for a prime minister on his way out:
-- He is unusually concerned about how the mass media reports news.
-- He dines only with his closest aides, receives fewer visitors and has a schedule full of holes.
-- He meets less frequently with the chief cabinet secretary, usually considered the prime minister's right-hand man.
-- He smiles less and less, wearing a deadpan expression.
According to reporters of The Yomiuri Shimbun covering the Prime Minister's Office, Kan lately displays all four characteristics.
Let's look at his situation point by point.
First, consider Kan's reactions to the recent series of reports by The Yomiuri Shimbun on the government's troubled attempts to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps' Futenma Air Station in Okinawa Prefecture.
The Futenma relocation issue is a thorny one; it brought down the previous Hatoyama administration.
The two governments agreed in May that the location of the alternative facility and the method of construction would be decided by the "end of August." The bilateral talks that followed failed to iron out the two sides' differences, however, due partly to strong opposition from the residents and governments of Okinawa Prefecture.
The headlines of those three reports:
"Government to give up plan to transfer U.S. Marines Corps' training exercises to Tokunoshima; decides not to earmark funds for research into move."
"Government abandons August deadline for deciding construction method of Futenma replacement facility; will submit several alternative plans to U.S."
"U.S. government gives up on transfer of marines from Okinawa to Guam in 2014; Guam's infrastructure construction behind schedule, leaving Futenma plan in jeopardy."
This series of scoops for the Yomiuri reported actual developments in negotiations between the Japanese and U.S. governments.
Kan suspected somebody within the government had fed information to Yomiuri Shimbun reporters. Kan scolded Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Kinya Takino, who is in charge of the Futenma issue, and ordered him to "look for the culprit" who had supposedly leaked the information.
Blaming the media for one's problems is a familiar habit of leaders in every nation. Kan also tried repeatedly to dodge responsibility for his inconsistent remarks concerning the party's pledge to raise the consumption tax during campaigning for the recent House of Councillors election, which resulted in a heavy loss for his Democratic Party of Japan.
"The mass media, which gave voters an impression that the government would raise the tax rate soon, is to blame," Kan said.
Needless to say, that is not the case. Voters saw through Kan's quibbling excuse.
The next thing I want to take up is the prime minister's far from hectic daily schedule.
On one recent weekday, Kan did not show up at the Prime Minister's Office until 10:30 a.m. His only important appointment for the day was a meeting with the leader of the DPJ's coalition partner, the People's New Party, scheduled for 6 p.m.
This meeting was to take place more than 10 days after the upper house election. Having failed to secure a majority in the upper house, the leaders of the two ruling parties should have met much earlier to discuss ways to deal with the "divided Diet," which will make passage of government-proposed bills difficult.
Kan, who was shattered by the election defeat, must have been exquisitely sensitive to the growing criticism of him from within his own party.
He was preoccupied with protecting his own position, holding a spate of meetings with successive DPJ presidents--Seiji Maehara, the land, infrastructure, transport and tourism minister; Katsuya Okada, the foreign minister; and Yukio Hatoyama, former prime minister--to build support and reinforce his standing.
One colleague Kan has not been meeting with so often is Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshito Sengoku.
Sengoku, an able politician at the center of the administration, is well-versed on policy matters but lacks experience in Diet affairs. It is yet to be seen how Sengoku will fare at the critical task of winning over opposition parties in the split Diet.
First, though, if Kan is to continue as prime minister, Sengoku has to work out a strategy to have him remain DPJ president after the party's presidential election in September.
Sengoku does not want to lose his current post, which he had long aspired to. Needless to say, he won't want to let Ichiro Ozawa, former secretary general of the party and Sengoku's sworn enemy, return to power. His support for Kan is surely sincere, then, but I imagine he simply doesn't know which problem to tackle first.
As Sengoku cannot make any clear projections about future political developments, he is meeting with Kan less and less frequently these days. There simply is not much for the two men to discuss. And Sengoku is not so close to Kan that he can simply drop in for discussions without a significant pretext.
Kan's personal demeanor of late also calls for examination. I asked Yomiuri reporters assigned to cover Kan exclusively about the prime minister's appearance since the election.
"He quickly changes from a brief, feigned smile to a deadpan face. His gaze is feeble, just like that of a dead fish. The voice is monotonous, low and hoarse," one reporter said.
Symptoms of stress so specifically observed hardly suggest a bright outlook for the future. Yet a House of Representatives member who has been watching Kan's career for many years categorically refutes the idea that the Kan administration is in its final phase.
"Mr. Kan has often played dead when the tide was against him. He has no philosophy nor belief system. He has no ideals. He doesn't care about reputation--that is to say, he has no pride. His only desire is for success," the lawmaker said.
"Now that he has reached the top and become prime minister, he wants to stay in the job as long as possible and realize his long-held wish of leaving his mark on history.
"Therefore, there's no way he'll abandon the administration as readily as his predecessor did. He'll definitely display amazing persistence," the lawmaker predicted.
Shortly, the curtain will rise on an all-or-nothing battle for the DPJ presidency. Kan, who may simply be playing dead for now, will take on Ozawa, who is lying low himself with a reputation stained by a political funds scandal.
Muraoka is political news editor of The Yomiuri Shimbun.
(Jul. 28, 2010)
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