September 27, 2024
TOKYO – China fired an intercontinental ballistic missile into the Pacific Ocean on Sept 25 in what was its first public test launch.
Hours later, a Japanese warship sailed through the Taiwan Strait for the first time since World War II as part of a joint patrol with Australian and New Zealand destroyers.
As Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) convenes “The Match” on Sept 27 to pick Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s successor, the new leader will have to grapple with global uncertainties and intensifying regional military activity.
There has been a series of firsts in recent weeks: the Aug 26 breach of Japanese airspace by a Chinese military plane; the Sept 18 passage of China’s Liaoning aircraft carrier through Japan’s Iriomote and Yonaguni islands, the latter just 110km from Taiwan; and the Sept 23 use of warning flares by Japanese fighter jets in response to an intruding Russian patrol craft.
Geopolitics will be an immediate challenge for Japan’s 102nd prime minister, who will be officially sworn in by the Diet on Oct 1, as the embattled Mr Kishida bows out over scandals and unhappiness over the rising cost of living.
All bets are now off, with the Japanese media in a tizzy to make sense of the twists and turns of the contest involving a record nine candidates. Reports are rife of warring party kingmakers – former prime ministers Yoshihide Suga and Taro Aso – vying to influence the outcome through backroom horse-trading.
Media surveys on Sept 26 suggest the winner would be former environment minister Shinjiro Koizumi, 43; former defence minister Shigeru Ishiba, 67; or current Economic Security Minister Sanae Takaichi, 63.
The stakes are high. Will they have the diplomatic chops to bring calm to a rapidly deteriorating regional security environment, and continue Mr Kishida’s outreach to the so-called Global South?
How will they work with the incoming president of the United States – Japan’s security ally is holding elections on Nov 5 – to ensure commitment to the Indo-Pacific at a time of worsening conflicts elsewhere?
Can they build better ties with China, just as the late former prime minister Shinzo Abe did even as he drew Japan closer to the US, and cultivate a more positive relationship that could go a long way towards abating anti-Japanese sentiments in China?
Will they insist on continuing visits to the controversial Yasukuni Shrine, where 14 Class A war criminals are honoured alongside 2.5 million war dead, that would worsen ties with not just China but also South Korea?
As it is, the controversial policy ideas among the front runners include an Asian version of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) military alliance and even the introduction of nuclear arms.
Domestically, the LDP – viewed as a party with entrenched vested interests after a damaging slush fund scandal implicated nearly one in five parliamentarians – aims to turn a new leaf through the Sept 27 election.
The victor will lead the party, which has enjoyed nearly uninterrupted rule since its founding in 1955, into imminent national elections.
All three front runners have said they will dissolve the Lower House for a snap poll within 2024 – well ahead of the term expiry in October 2025. The fixed-term Upper House, meanwhile, must also go to a vote in July 2025.
The new prime minister will face off against a new leader of the opposition, with the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan having on Sept 23 installed as its leader the pragmatic and centrist former prime minister Yoshihiko Noda, 67.
Political scientist Toru Yoshida of Kyoto’s Doshisha University told The Straits Times that for the LDP to rebuild trust, the public must view the party race as having selected “a new flag bearer who can set a direction not just for coming elections, but for years to come”.
The LDP will convene at 1pm (12pm in Singapore) on Sept 27 to choose its new president, with 736 votes at stake.
The party’s 368 lawmakers – up by one from the previously-reported 367 after the LDP won a seat in Hokkaido on Sept 18 – will each get one vote. The other half will be proportionally allocated among 1.1 million rank-and-file members across 47 prefectural chapters.
If no one scores an outright majority – the odds-on scenario – the poll will go into a run-off between the top two candidates. In this case, each of the 368 lawmakers and 47 prefectural chapters will have one ballot, for a total of 415 votes.
The final results are expected at around 3.30pm (2.30pm in Singapore) on Sept 27.
Media surveys suggest that Mr Koizumi enjoys a strong lead among lawmakers, followed by former economic security minister Takayuki Kobayashi, 49; Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi, 63; and LDP secretary-general Toshimitsu Motegi, 68.
The picture changes when rank-and-file member preferences are taken into account, with Ms Takaichi and Mr Ishiba holding a strong lead over Mr Koizumi.
The other candidates are Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa, 71; Digital Minister Taro Kono, 61; and former chief cabinet secretary Katsunobu Kato, 68.
The election has exposed chasms within the LDP, which may tilt left or right depending on who wins.
Mr Ishiba will be fifth-time lucky if he wins. Centre to his key policy proposals are regional revitalisation, and the creation of an Asian Nato.
Ms Takaichi and Mr Koizumi, meanwhile, would make history if they win – she, as Japan’s first female prime minister, and he as the youngest prime minister by far – but both are polar opposites in their policy beliefs.
Ms Takaichi, a staunch conservative, has vowed to carry Mr Abe’s torch as his protege.
She backs nuclear weapons, and has said she will continue visiting Yasukuni Shrine as PM.
And unlike Mr Koizumi, she is against such policies as the legal right for married couples to keep separate surnames, and the full deregulation of ride-sharing.
Yet her election could also make the party’s vow to rebuild trust seem like nothing more than a charade, experts say, given that many of her supporters were implicated in the slush fund scandal.
Mr Koizumi, the son of former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi, can deliver the strongest signal of rejuvenation and change.
Yet he is a diplomatic neophyte, and his proposal to dramatically reform Japan’s labour market has chipped away at his support.
Mr Koizumi wants to revise laws to give companies more freedom to dismiss workers – which businesses have been lobbying for – arguing that this will stoke dynamism, innovation, productivity and, eventually, sustainable wage growth.
The plan also requires large companies to provide skill retraining and re-employment support to dismissed employees.
But media coverage has been vastly negative, focusing on the threat to iron rice bowls. Japan’s most-read newspaper, the Yomiuri Shimbun, warned in an editorial that “social unrest could increase”, with the plan putting more people off marriage and children.
Whoever wins the LDP poll will get to influence policy but should, experts said, also act to cement a power base within the party.
Otherwise, as political scientist Yu Uchiyama of The University of Tokyo warned: “If their approval ratings fall, there could easily be political instability”, as in the case of Mr Suga and Mr Kishida.