Abe Shinzo Resigns, to be Replaced by Rozen Aso?
Posted by 0rion on September 12th, 2007 - 8:58 am
Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, who’s been under the gun ever since his party (the LDP) was royally whupped in the July 29 elections, has finally announced that he’s stepping down.
Considering all the troubles he’s had with his Agricultural ministers lately, as well as his push to extend the increasingly unpopular “support-the-US-war-on-terror” mission, it certainly comes as no surprise. It was a bit of a shock how suddenly he announced his resignation, however.
OK, time to put on my rant hat.
While I’m no longer a resident of Japan, I do feel like I still have some vested interest in Japanese politics, especially since I hope to go back someday. On one hand, I think Abe can be commended for helping to patch up relations with neighboring countries, especially after former Prime Minister Koizumi’s repeated Yasukuni visits and belligerent stance toward Japan’s neighbors.
On the other hand, however, his push to rewrite Japanese history and foster strong nationalism through the education system really rubs me the wrong way. To deny or cover up things like the rape of Nanking or the abduction of Korean women who were forced to become ianfu (military prostitutes) during the war is highly dangerous, in my opinion. I understand that the Japanese want to protect their face in the international community, but there’s a difference between rejecting actions taken by your forebears and flat out denying that they ever happened.
If the United States started to deny that the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki happened, and removed all references to the events from history textbooks, you can be sure that the Japanese would be up in arms protesting.
Anyway, Abe seems like decent enough chap, but he really lacks the charismatic and decisive leadership of someone like Koizumi, who despite his diplomatic shortcomings was able to really get the ball rolling and make things happen domestically. Hopefully a new and more effective Cabinet will be assembled without too much turmoil.
Right now it seems like Aso Taro is the likely favorite. Although I don’t agree with a lot of his foreign policy statements, he seems more capable of being bipartisan. Also, he’s supposedly somewhat otaku, and is especially known as a big Rozen Maiden fan.
Edit: Interestingly, while the overall stockmarket closed lower on the news of Abe’s resignation, according to a link posted on DarkMirage’s site by don777, otaku related stocks took an upturn after the announcement. Not sure what that means exactly, but it sure tickles my funny bone. 
What do you think? If Aso becomes the next Prime Minister, what will that mean for us otaku? Government sponsored international goodwill tours by popular mangaka? A new “Otaku” visa class for people who are coming just for Akiba? Suiseiseki becomes the official party mascot?
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If the guy made so many unpopular decisions I guess this move stands to reason - I can’t say I was surprised really after following some of the news stories.
If I lived there I’d probably feel a similar way about this as I did when our own PM (Tony Blair) resigned. Like Abe, he’s a decent bloke but I disagreed with a lot of his policies, especially supporting the US. That’s two PMs who have come unstuck by backing Bush…make of that what you will.
On a somewhat unrelated side note, one of the greatest side attractions I found while visiting Japan were the street-side political commentators. All of a sudden some van with large banners on it would roll up to a train station or some other area with a dense population and out would come a megaphone and a very passionate sounding political speech. It was fun to watch though with my limited understanding of Japanese I rarely had any clue what was being said.
@Martin
That’s a good point; I never really thought about Bush’s connection to both of them. So if we wanted Saddam out of power, maybe all we needed to do was get him to join the war on terror.
To be fair, though, Abe is pretty hawkish just in general, so his support for Bush is probably just an extension of his larger goals to remilitarize Japan.
Or it could just be what Azrael says - a huge Gaijin Smash on Bush’s part.
Is this politics I see in an anime blog? Great write up…there’s more to Japanese culture than anime! Will Japan’s flag change to a Rozen Maiden icon now? (because that would be pretty sweet)
Even if he isn’t a big otaku, I look forward to some funny fan creations featuring Rozen Maiden.