PROMISING TO “change history”, Japan’s new prime minister Yukio Hatoyama took power yesterday, officially ending half a century of dominance by the conservative Liberal Democrats (LDP).
“The battle starts now,” announced the former academic, who says he wants to revolutionise government and introduce European-style welfare policies to Asia’s biggest economy.
Mr Hatoyama’s Democratic party (DPJ) won 308 out of 440 seats in last month’s lower house election, annihilating the once invincible LDP, which lost two-thirds of its parliamentary strength.
Democrats effectively control both houses after forming a coalition last week with the Social Democratic Party and People’s New Party (PNN).
The DPJ says it will transform the so-called “iron triangle” of conservative politicians, business and top bureaucrats run by the outgoing government since 1955.
It has also pledged to boost social spending and the minimum wage, cut greenhouse gases by 25 per cent below 1990 levels, and work for a more “mature and equal” alliance with military partner the US, meaning greater independence.
But the new government opens for business amid Japan’s worst crisis in a generation: the highest public debt in the developed world, a spluttering economy that has been in the doldrums since the early 1990s and the looming collapse of the nation’s pension system.
Casting a pall over all is the nation’s gloomy demographics – few babies and the planet’s fastest aging population.
Rival China is set to surpass it as the world’s second-largest economy this year or next, adding to the sense for many Japanese of a nation that has passed its peak.
Many wonder if the new liberal-left government can deal with this daunting list of problems, or even hold together, given what the liberal-left Asahi newspaper calls the “colossal” differences between its coalition partners. The PNN is out to reverse one of the last major policy achievements of the outgoing LDP administration – the privatisation of the giant Japan Post.
Social Democrats want Japan to withdraw from co-operating with the US “war on terror”, ending the deployment of its armed forces abroad. Even within the DPJ, a potentially combustible hybrid of left and right-wing, disputes over basic policy seem inevitable.
Some of Mr Hatoyama’s cabinet choices have also raised eyebrows. Veteran power broker Ichiro Ozawa – dubbed the “Shadow Shogun” in the press – has been made secretary general and reportedly played a major part in picking key cabinet posts, despite corruption allegations that cost him the party leadership.
Former party leaders Katsuya Okada and Hirohisa Fujii will handle, respectively, the key foreign and finance portfolios, creating fears of a party with too many chiefs.
The vanquished LDP, meanwhile, is struggling to fill the leadership post left open when outgoing prime minister Taro Aso stepped down. An election later this month will decide who will lead the party to take on the Democrats in elections next year.