Political crisis in Japan. The head of government, Fumio Kishida, has been forced to force the resignation of four of his ministers due to a scandal of irregular financing and black payments. The four affected parties in question resigned en masse this Thursday, hours before Kishida announced the name of the new holders of his portfolio.
The scandal comes at a bad time for the prime minister, whose popularity is at practically historic lows for his party, with polls giving just 17.1% approval for his government, with a liberal economic tendency. Among the ministers under suspicion is Kishida’s right-hand man as well as spokesperson and number two of the government, Hirokazu Matsuno. The other resignations are the Minister of Economy, Commerce and Industry, Yasutoshi Nishimura; the head of the Interior, Junji Suzuki, and the head of Agriculture, Ichiro Miyashita.
It turns out that all of them belonged to the faction of Shinzo Abe, historical leader of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) who was murdered by the son of a family supposedly defrauded by the Moon sect, favored by Abe and even before that by his father. and his grandfather. After the shock in Japanese society due to the assassination – although Abe was no longer prime minister – there were many questions about the bites that the ultra-conservative sect of South Korean origin dispenses to the political class, an open secret in Japan. The PLD had to acknowledge that 179 of its 379 parliamentarians maintained “contacts” with the sect.
Once again, undeclared fundraising, that is, corruption, has put the Liberal Democratic Party, which has governed Japan almost uninterruptedly since the American occupation forces after World War II, in the eye of the storm. , returned the reins of political power to affected Japanese, in the context of the Cold War and the anti-communist crusade.
Although Kishida is not required to undergo elections until October 2025, some observers doubt his ability to remain in power until then. Above all, because it is not clear that the four resigners are the only ones with dirty laundry, in a party so closely linked to business interests that it could be confused with an employers’ association.
“I have submitted my resignation to Kishida to avoid problems in the development of national politics,” Matsuno said at a press conference after formalizing the resignation of senior officials, in which he said he was aware that the case is increasing “public distrust.” towards politics”. In reality, the Japanese do not need any new scandal to stay away from parties, since the Japanese educational system itself seems oriented to separate citizens from political concerns.
Buried in the noise of resignations, two changes in economic orientation loom that could be crucial. Kishida has let it slip that he will not raise taxes to rearm his army, as planned, but rather he will reduce them. Likewise, years of ultra-low, if not negative, interest rates could be coming to an end.
Kishida would already have the additions to his cabinet decided: former Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi as spokesperson, former Minister of Justice Ken Saito as head of Economy, former Minister of the Interior Takeaki Matsumoto would return to the position after being replaced in the Cabinet reshuffle last September, and The former minister in charge of demographic decline and other social challenges Tetsushi Sakamoto would take over as Minister of Agriculture.
The prosecution is investigating a series of income from fundraising events organized by factions (political groups within the same formation) of the ruling party and which went to senior officials who supposedly did not declare them, which would imply a violation of the Japanese regulations.
The black payments amounted to at least 500 million yen (about 3.2 million euros) and were distributed among dozens of members of one of the main factions of the LDP, according to details of the case published by local media.
In addition to the four replaced ministers, other important profiles of the PLD tainted by irregularities are the general secretary of the party in the Upper House, Hiroshige Seko, the head of political strategy, Koichi Hagiuda, or the former Olympic minister Seiko Hashimoto. Given the severity of the crisis, there is pressure for Kishida to suspend his trip to South America scheduled for the beginning of next year, to Chile and Brazil, countries with their own line in international politics.
Kishida’s unpopularity has to do with the population’s discontent in the face of two phenomena practically unprecedented for decades: A continued depreciation of the yen and no less persistent inflation.
Since coming to power, Kishida, 66, has been seen as a compromise figure within the right-wing Liberal Democratic Party. If signs of corruption, so far limited to the late Abe’s most conservative faction, were to spread to Kishida’s faction, calling early elections could be an almost inevitable way out. Although the opposition, chronically prostrate and deficient in vitamins in Japan, will hardly take advantage of the opportunity, since its room for maneuver is much less than that of the party-state that the LDP has become. Japan has not completely lifted its head after the pandemic. Although the disappointment is much deeper and has to do with social stagnation, demographic aging and the stagnation of its economy – the one that was to take over the world 35 years ago – in the face of the dynamism of South Korea and the unparalleled rise of China.
Although Kishida was head of Japanese diplomacy with Abe, in international politics he has not deviated even one millimeter from the line of his American ally. At his request – and taking advantage of the return of the right in Seoul – he has staged a rapprochement with South Korea, although the trauma of Koreans due to the excesses of the Japanese occupation and colonization is not going to disappear overnight.
Kishida, elected representative for Hiroshima – like his father and grandfather before him – represents the limits of what is possible in Japanese democracy. When these limits overflow, they always do so to the right. These months, ordering to silence all environmental organizations that have questioned the discharge of radioactive water from the damaged Fukushima plant into the Pacific.
