Two tiny coalition parties on which Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama relies to help pass legislation are leveraging their position to affect government policies ranging from economic stimulus to diplomacy.
The partnership is also adding to concerns about who is in charge on key policies and threatening to erode voter support for Hatoyama by making him look indecisive.
The awkward alliance with Hatoyama’s Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) will likely persist at least for another half year, pressuring the government to spend more on economic stimulus despite concern over ballooning debt and risking frayed ties with security ally Washington in a row over a US base.
“These parties only have less than a year in the spotlight and they know it, so they want to make their presence felt in that time,” political commentator Akira Hayasaka said.
With little prospect of an alternative partner on the horizon, coalition leaders are able to throw their weight around, at least until an upper house election set for the middle of next year, when the DPJ hopes to win a single-handed majority.
Shizuka Kamei’s People’s New Party has just three seats in the 480-seat lower house, while Mizuho Fukushima’s Social Democratic Party (SDP) has seven.
In the latest policy struggle, an announcement of an economic stimulus package was delayed yesterday thanks to Kamei, a veteran proponent of big spending, who wants it expanded.
Though not an obvious fit with Kamei, whose party is hawkish on defense, SDP leader Fukushima has echoed his spending demands and the two have joined hands to try to block a plan to move a US Marine base within the southern island of Okinawa.
Fukushima on Thursday threatened to pull her party out of the ruling bloc if the DPJ pressed ahead with the existing plan, agreed with Washington in 2006.
Hatoyama was quick to reassure Fukushima publicly that he saw her party’s opinions as important, in an apparent effort to keep the coalition together.
“He’s trying to be all things to all people, which will actually stop him from moving in any direction,” said Katsuhiko Nakamura of think tank Asian Forum Japan. “Leaving it until next year will make things worse.”
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