Prime Minister Fukuda resigns

Japan Press Weekly

Japan Press Service Co., Ltd. is the only news agency providing information of progressive, democratic movements in Japan

Prime Minister Fukuda resigns

Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo held a news conference on short notice at the Prime Minister’s Official Residence on September 1 to express his intention to step down, saying, “New policies should be followed under new leadership.”

Commenting on Fukuda’s resignation announcement at a news conference on the same day, Japanese Communist Party Chair Shii Kazuo stated as follows:

“Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo has expressed his intention to resign. This way of giving up power is very irresponsible.

He is the second prime minister in a row after former Prime Minister Abe Shinzo to abandon power in the run-up to an Extraordinary Session of the Diet. This shows how serious the impasse reached by Liberal Democratic-Komei government is. It also shows that the LDP-Komei government is in a state of disintegration.

His resignation will be followed by the election of a new LDP President and new prime minister. It is natural that the newly elected prime minister should seek the people’s judgment. It is natural and inevitable that the new prime minister should dissolve the House of Representatives for a general election.

Already two successive cabinets, one led by Mr. Abe and the other by Mr. Fukuda, came into being without an electoral verdict. It will be impermissible that the next prime minister forgo a general election.

At the same time, the Extraordinary Session of the Diet, which is now set to open, should hold a far-reaching discussion on key national issues. It will be logical to call a general election after making clear what the election issues are through parliamentary discussion.

In fact, people are suffering a lot of hardships due to rising prices and are in a kind of state of emergency. Agriculture, fisheries, various small- and medium-sized businesses, and trucking firms are faced with enormous difficulties. The question is how to deal with their difficulties.

There are also critical issues that are carried over from the previous session of the Diet, including the new health insurance system that virtually abandons the elderly aged 75 and over and the use of temporary workers as throwaway workers. The need now is to find a fundamental solution to these problems.

We should also question the Japanese subservience to the United States in continuing to dispatch the Self-Defense Forces to the Indian Ocean.

The Diet must publicly discuss all these key issues, domestic and international, not just in the plenary sessions but at the budget and other standing committees of both houses. After making clear the issues to be dealt with, the government should ask for a judgment in a general election.”

- Akahata, September 2, 2008