Asia-Pacific

Japan's Cabinet resigns en masse

(Agencies)
Updated: 2010-06-04 10:04

This file photo shows the Cabinet of Yukio Hatoyama in Tokyo on Sept 16, 2009. [Xinhua]

TOKYO - Japan's Cabinet resigned en masse Friday to clear the way for a ruling party vote to select a successor to former Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, who resigned two days earlier.

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Members of the Democratic Party of Japan will meet later Friday morning to pick a new party chief, who will almost certainly be installed as prime minister because the ruling party controls a majority in the more powerful lower house of parliament.

Former Finance Minister Naoto Kan, a straight-talker with activist roots, is widely expected to succeed Hatoyama, who quit amid plunging approval ratings and public disappointment over his broken campaign promises.

The other candidate is little-known Shinji Tarutoko, chairman of the party's environmental committee, who has the backing of some younger party members and the largest faction led by the party's No. 2, who also stepped down Wednesday.

Whoever wins the top job will face daunting choices in how to lead the world's second-largest economy, which is burdened with massive public debt, a sluggish economy and an aging, shrinking population.

He also must quickly revive his party's tarnished image before upper house elections are held next month. The vote is seen as a referendum on the Democrats' short rule since they defeated the long-ruling conservatives in lower house elections last August, and the party's prospects look rather bleak.

Kan, 63, may be the DPJ's best hope for restoring confidence in its ability to govern and delivering a viable roadmap for the future. He is everything Hatoyama was not -- decisive, outspoken and a grass-roots populist with common roots. Unlike recent prime ministers, he was not born into an elite political family.

Kan gained popularity in 1996 as health minister when he exposed a government cover-up of HIV-tainted blood products that caused thousands of hemophilia patients to contract the virus that causes AIDS. During an E-coli outbreak that hit sprout growers hard, he appeared on national television and ate sprouts to dispel rumors that they were unsafe.

Kan, along with Hatoyama, was one of several original members to launch the party that became the DPJ in September 1996 in a merger with several other small parties.

Known for speaking his mind, Kan was the first official to declare deflation in Japan last year and has been critical of the Bank of Japan for not doing enough to fight deflation.

Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada and Transport Minister Seiji Maehara had been considered contenders for the party leadership, but they both announced support for Kan instead.

After the DPJ selects its new leader, the parliament's two chambers will vote Friday afternoon to install the new prime minister. His new Cabinet could be named later Friday.

The Democrats are hoping that Wednesday's resignation of Hatoyama and No. 2 Ichiro Ozawa -- seen by many as the party's powerbroker -- will give it a fresh face for July's elections. Both men had been ensnared in political funding scandals.

A poor performance in the upper house elections, where half the seats are up for grabs, would not threaten the Democrats' grip on power because they command a large lower-house majority. But heavy losses would likely force the party to woo new coalition partners to ensure smoother passage of bills.