ID :
79144
Wed, 09/09/2009 - 15:04
Auther :
Shortlink :
http://m.oananews.org//node/79144
The shortlink copeid
Aso to resign as LDP chief before Diet session on Sept. 16+
TOKYO, Sept. 8 Kyodo - Prime Minister Taro Aso said Tuesday that he will step down as president of the Liberal Democratic Party on the morning of Sept. 16 before the House of Representatives elects the next prime minister in a special Diet session.
Aso's resignation, which will come half a month ahead of the end of his term on
Sept. 30, is aimed at making it easier for LDP lawmakers in the lower house to
decide who to vote for when choosing the next prime minister.
''I told the General Council meeting in the morning that my Cabinet will resign
en masse on the morning of September 16...and that I will also resign as LDP
president,'' Aso told 185 other LDP lawmakers at a general meeting. ''The
important thing is that we will work on (the vote) in a fully unified manner
because we will be an opposition party.''
Yukio Hatoyama, president of the Democratic Party of Japan, which won a
landslide victory in the Aug. 30 general election that ended the LDP's almost
continuous rule over a half century, is set to be elected new prime minister
due to the nearly two-thirds majority the party captured in the chamber.
Because the LDP presidency will be vacant when the chamber picks the prime
minister, LDP lawmakers decided at the same meeting that the party's lower
house members should vote for Masatoshi Wakabayashi, chairman of the party's
Joint Plenary Meeting of Party Members of Both Houses of the Diet.
There is almost no chance the 75-year-old House of Councillors member will be
elected prime minister, however, because the LDP, with only 119 seats in the
lower house, cannot secure a majority even with the help of its one-time
coalition partner, the New Komeito party, which holds 21 seats.
It is highly unusual for the LDP to decide to vote for someone other than its
president when choosing the prime minister. Some LDP members expressed
reservations about casting ballots for their departing leader because under his
leadership, their party suffered a crushing defeat that put it out of power for
only the second time since its founding in 1955.
The decision to vote for Wakabayashi, in the end, was a compromise of sorts
given that other LDP members also called for avoiding casting ballots without
any name on them and for finding a candidate every LDP member in the lower
house can cast a ballot for.
A party leadership election to pick Aso's successor, meanwhile, is set to be
held on Sept. 28.
Later in the day, Aso said he decided to quit before the parliamentary session
convenes because he wants to avoid creating disarray within the LDP as the
party gropes its way toward renewal.
''I said I will resign at that stage as a way to avoid confusion and pave the
way (for casting ballots for Wakabayashi), because confusion is what I want to
avoid the most,'' he told reporters.
With Wakabayashi set as the LDP's choice for the next prime minister, Aso said,
''There'll be at least no necessity to write 'Taro Aso' (on the ballots).''
As to Aso's successor as LDP president, no obvious contender has so far emerged
because Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Yoichi Masuzoe, a popular
second-term upper house lawmaker who is considered the leading candidate, has
announced that he will not run.
At Tuesday's meeting, Taro Kono and several other party members called for
halving the number of members a person needs to enlist as backers to make a bid
in the party leadership election from the current 20, on the grounds that the
party now has significantly fewer lawmakers -- 201 in both chambers, compared
with 382 prior to the election.
But the party leadership argued against changing the rule, noting that the
required number only represents 10 percent of all LDP lawmakers and therefore
should not be too high a hurdle for someone aspiring to be a party leader. The
members eventually voted down the motion.
In a related move, former LDP Secretary General Hidenao Nakagawa declared the
same day his intention not to run in the upcoming race, saying that a
presidential candidate should be someone who can dissolve factions and lead the
party as a representative of a new generation of lawmakers.
''I don't qualify for that,'' the 65-year-old told reporters, adding that he
plans to do his best to support a qualified person.
Meanwhile, Secretary General Hiroyuki Hosoda told the general meeting that as
part of efforts to kick-start the party's renewal process, party lawmakers will
immediately form groups to review the causes of the party's electoral loss and
study ways to revitalize it.
On Aug. 31, Aso offered to quit as party president to take responsibility for
the LDP's devastating loss in the lower house election held one day earlier, in
which the long-governing party lost nearly two-thirds of the seats it held in
the powerful lower house before the election.
==Kyodo
2009-09-08 23:01:28
Aso's resignation, which will come half a month ahead of the end of his term on
Sept. 30, is aimed at making it easier for LDP lawmakers in the lower house to
decide who to vote for when choosing the next prime minister.
''I told the General Council meeting in the morning that my Cabinet will resign
en masse on the morning of September 16...and that I will also resign as LDP
president,'' Aso told 185 other LDP lawmakers at a general meeting. ''The
important thing is that we will work on (the vote) in a fully unified manner
because we will be an opposition party.''
Yukio Hatoyama, president of the Democratic Party of Japan, which won a
landslide victory in the Aug. 30 general election that ended the LDP's almost
continuous rule over a half century, is set to be elected new prime minister
due to the nearly two-thirds majority the party captured in the chamber.
Because the LDP presidency will be vacant when the chamber picks the prime
minister, LDP lawmakers decided at the same meeting that the party's lower
house members should vote for Masatoshi Wakabayashi, chairman of the party's
Joint Plenary Meeting of Party Members of Both Houses of the Diet.
There is almost no chance the 75-year-old House of Councillors member will be
elected prime minister, however, because the LDP, with only 119 seats in the
lower house, cannot secure a majority even with the help of its one-time
coalition partner, the New Komeito party, which holds 21 seats.
It is highly unusual for the LDP to decide to vote for someone other than its
president when choosing the prime minister. Some LDP members expressed
reservations about casting ballots for their departing leader because under his
leadership, their party suffered a crushing defeat that put it out of power for
only the second time since its founding in 1955.
The decision to vote for Wakabayashi, in the end, was a compromise of sorts
given that other LDP members also called for avoiding casting ballots without
any name on them and for finding a candidate every LDP member in the lower
house can cast a ballot for.
A party leadership election to pick Aso's successor, meanwhile, is set to be
held on Sept. 28.
Later in the day, Aso said he decided to quit before the parliamentary session
convenes because he wants to avoid creating disarray within the LDP as the
party gropes its way toward renewal.
''I said I will resign at that stage as a way to avoid confusion and pave the
way (for casting ballots for Wakabayashi), because confusion is what I want to
avoid the most,'' he told reporters.
With Wakabayashi set as the LDP's choice for the next prime minister, Aso said,
''There'll be at least no necessity to write 'Taro Aso' (on the ballots).''
As to Aso's successor as LDP president, no obvious contender has so far emerged
because Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Yoichi Masuzoe, a popular
second-term upper house lawmaker who is considered the leading candidate, has
announced that he will not run.
At Tuesday's meeting, Taro Kono and several other party members called for
halving the number of members a person needs to enlist as backers to make a bid
in the party leadership election from the current 20, on the grounds that the
party now has significantly fewer lawmakers -- 201 in both chambers, compared
with 382 prior to the election.
But the party leadership argued against changing the rule, noting that the
required number only represents 10 percent of all LDP lawmakers and therefore
should not be too high a hurdle for someone aspiring to be a party leader. The
members eventually voted down the motion.
In a related move, former LDP Secretary General Hidenao Nakagawa declared the
same day his intention not to run in the upcoming race, saying that a
presidential candidate should be someone who can dissolve factions and lead the
party as a representative of a new generation of lawmakers.
''I don't qualify for that,'' the 65-year-old told reporters, adding that he
plans to do his best to support a qualified person.
Meanwhile, Secretary General Hiroyuki Hosoda told the general meeting that as
part of efforts to kick-start the party's renewal process, party lawmakers will
immediately form groups to review the causes of the party's electoral loss and
study ways to revitalize it.
On Aug. 31, Aso offered to quit as party president to take responsibility for
the LDP's devastating loss in the lower house election held one day earlier, in
which the long-governing party lost nearly two-thirds of the seats it held in
the powerful lower house before the election.
==Kyodo
2009-09-08 23:01:28
