Japanese Prime Minister to resign

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe today announced he would resign, ending a troubled year-old government that has suffered a string of damaging scandals and a humiliating electoral defeat.

“In the present situation, it is difficult to push ahead with effective policies that win the support and trust of the public,” Abe said in a nationally televised news conference. “I have decided that we need a change in this situation.”

Abe, 52, whose support rating has fallen to 30 percent, cited the ruling party’s defeat in July 29 elections for the upper house of parliament in his decision, and said he was stepping down to minimise the political confusion in Tokyo.

Abe said he had instructed party leaders to immediately search for a new premier, but he did not announce a date for his departure from office. His former foreign minister, Taro Aso, is considered a front-runner to replace him.

Abe said he was stepping down because he lacked the power to rally people together, NHK quoted Aso, now LDP secretary-general, as telling reporters. Abe also said he was “tired” and had lost his political energy, NHK reported.

Abe, a nationalist who entered office as Japan’s youngest post-war premier, had also been facing a battle in parliament over his efforts to extend the country’s refuelling mission in support of the US-led operation in Afghanistan. Just days earlier, he said he would quit if he failed to win parliamentary passage of legislation extending the mission.

But today, Abe suggested that his departure could aid bipartisan passage of the bill, citing the refusal of Ichiro Ozawa, head of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan, to meet with him today.

“I have pondered how Japan should continue its fight against terrorism,” Abe said. “I now believe we need change. So Japan must continue its fight against terrorism under a new prime minister.”

The United States has turned up the pressure on Japan to extend the mission. US Ambassador Thomas Schieffer met with Cabinet officials, including Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura, to make Washington’s case for extension.

The plenary session of the lower house was to be delayed until at least Friday.

Abe’s resignation marked a rapid fall from power for a prime minister who came into office a year ago with ambitious plans to repair frayed relations with Asian neighbours, revise the 1947 pacifist constitution, and bolster Japan’s role in international diplomatic and military affairs.

The prime minister, whose grandfather was premier and whose father was a foreign minister, initially met with success in fence-mending trips last autumn to China and South Korea. He also passed a law bolstering patriotic education and upgrading the Defence Agency to a full ministry for the first time since the Second World War.

But a string of scandals starting late last year quickly eroded support for Abe. Four Cabinet minister were forced to resign over the past nine months, and one – his first agriculture minister – committed suicide over a money scandal.

Abe was also hurt by a scandal over the loss of some 50 million pension claims. He apparently ignored early warnings of the looming scandal, and then defended the government when news of the losses broke.

Support for the political blue-blood was also eroded by his concentration on ideological issues – such as patriotism and constitutional reform – at a time when many Japanese are concerned over the widening gap between rich and poor and other bread-and-butter worries.

Opposition politicians said it was about time Abe resigned.

“It is irresponsible for him (to quit) after he gave a policy speech and was to face parliament questioning. He should have quit right after the upper house elections,” Mizuho Fukushima, head of the opposition Social Democratic Party, told NHK.

The results of the Abe government was also a sharp reversal of fortunes for the ruling party, which has controlled Japan almost uninterruptedly since it was formed in 1955.

Abe succeeded the wildly popular Junichiro Koizumi, who led the LDP to a landslide victory in elections for the powerful lower house in 2005.

Though Aso is considered a front-runner to succeed Abe, it is not clear whether he has the political clout and popular support to stop the LDP’s slide in popularity.