Fate of long-dominant LDP in question after crucial election

Aug. 28, 2009

Fate of long-dominant LDP in question after crucial election


Takeo Miki, who served as Japan’s prime minister from 1974 to 1976, was a nonmainstream conservative politician. Miki was one of the few Liberal Democrats who successfully tried to distance themselves from money politics. As a result, he was called “Mr. Clean.” The Liberal Democratic Party has ruled Japan’s politics almost uninterruptedly since 1955 when it came into being through a merger of conservative forces. But the party is on the brink of losing power now.
The party and its minor coalition partner have had a two-thirds majority in the all-important House of Representatives, the Lower House. The Lower House election, set for the coming Sunday, is expected to change Japan’s political landscape as voters are dissatisfied with the LDP’s failure to break with money-oriented politics and sever cozy relations with bureaucrats and interest groups. Political pundits predict that around two-thirds of seats will this time go to the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan.
Miki lived in an area in Shibuya, uptown Tokyo. His former residence, the Japanese-style house which is about half a century old, is opened to the public irregularly because his kin still live there. The district used to be a calm residential area, but the house is surrounded with big condos at present. It is next door to the fashionable Daikanyama area which attracts young people all the seasons. “It was just an ordinary house, wasn’t it?” my wife said. The house was not actually an ordinary house, slightly bigger than those of ordinary people, but it looked humble compared to the residences of other former prime ministers, some of them called “palaces.” Miki started his political career before the last war and underwent many hardships. But he came back every time.
Following is a waka poem composed by Michizane Sugawara, a noted scholar and a top court official from the ninth to early 10th centuries, when he was transported under guard to a place of exile:

There are many paths here and there on this hill,
but no one tells me “This way please. This road leads you back to the capital.”
(A personal translation)

Michizane, then deputy prime minister of the Emperor's government, lost a power struggle to be exiled. He could never come back and he died in exile.
One of Miki’s tough times came in 1942 when he managed to win a seat in parliament in an election monopolized by a body affiliated with the then Hideki Tojo government. Miki’s influence grew gradually in the postwar period, but his power base in the LDP was fragile until he came to power. He was handpicked to be prime minister by a caretaker of the LDP in a political vacuum after Kakuei Tanaka resigned in disgrace. His job was to salvage and clean up the LDP. It is far from certain if any salvager will emerge for the party after its expected defeat in the forthcoming election. But if a matured democracy with two equally influential parties is to be established in Japan, the LDP should be asked to train itself as a healthy opposition party from now on.