Hatoyama completes Cabinet roster, no private-sector person included

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TOKYO, Sept. 16 Kyodo -

Democratic Party of Japan leader Yukio Hatoyama said Tuesday he has completed
selection of his Cabinet ahead of its launch Wednesday, but kept the roster
mostly secret but for two posts given to the party's coalition partners and the
fact that it includes no one from the private sector.
Hatoyama, set to be elected as prime minister Wednesday, told reporters Tuesday
evening that all the Cabinet posts have been decided and he has made phone
calls to each person concerned to tell them.
While saying he cannot disclose the new ministers' names because it is
something he should do only after becoming prime minister, Hatoyama confirmed
media reports that he has offered Shizuka Kamei, leader of the People's New
Party which will form a coalition government with the DPJ, a new Cabinet post
overseeing postal and financial affairs.
He also acknowledged having tapped Mizuho Fukushima, leader of the Social
Democratic Party, another coalition partner, for the post of state minister in
charge of consumer affairs, the declining birthrate, food safety and gender
equality.
Also on Tuesday, Acting President Ichiro Ozawa became the party's secretary
general, second in line after Hatoyama. The appointment was formally approved
at a general meeting in Tokyo earlier in the evening that brought together DPJ
members from both the lower and upper houses.
DPJ Supreme Adviser Hirohisa Fujii, a 77-year-old former Finance Ministry
bureaucrat and finance minister, is set to join the Cabinet and has been named
as a strong candidate for finance minister although Ozawa has reportedly
opposed his appointment, DPJ sources said.
Former DPJ Secretary General Tatsuo Kawabata, 64, is slated to become minister
of education, culture, sports, science and technology, and the post of land,
infrastructure, transport and tourism minister is expected to go to Vice
President Seiji Maehara, 47, the sources said.
Other names that have been floated as possible candidates for Cabinet posts are
party policy chief Masayuki Naoshima, upper house member Keiko Chiba, Election
Campaign Committee Chairman Hirotaka Akamatsu, former policy chief Yoshito
Sengoku, Sakihito Ozawa, chairman of the party's National Rallying and
Canvassing Committee, and deputy policy chief Akira Nagatsuma.
Meanwhile, Ichiro Ozawa, 67, was given a free hand by Hatoyama in appointing
other new DPJ leaders. He told reporters in the evening that Diet Affairs
Committee Chairman Kenji Yamaoka, 66, will retain his party post.
Among other posts, Takahiro Yokomichi, former vice speaker of the House of
Representatives, is set to become lower house speaker as he has accepted the
offer from Hatoyama. Yokomichi, 68, will be elected the new speaker of the
chamber at a special parliamentary session on Wednesday.
Hatoyama is set to be voted in as the next prime minister at the parliamentary
session and will launch his Cabinet shortly afterward.
''It's a magnificent sight,'' the prime minister in waiting told the hundreds
of DPJ lawmakers gathered at the general meeting. ''From now on, let's give
politics back into the hands of the people, with our own hands.''
''We can't let our calls for a departure from reliance on bureaucrats end up
being mere words,'' he added.
A former DPJ leader who will take charge of day-to-day party affairs and
elections as the new No. 2 party executive, Ozawa said at the meeting, ''As
secretary general, I'm resolved to do my best with all my power to fulfill my
duty.''
Before the event, the DPJ, which has long been Japan's largest opposition
party, held a guidance and educational session for 143 lawmakers who won Diet
seats for the first time in the Aug. 30 lower house election.
''I believe you will realize tomorrow and beyond that you won your seats in a
historic period,'' DPJ executive Naoto Kan told the novices at the opening of
the session. Kan is almost certain to get the post of minister in charge of the
planned National Strategy Bureau, a policymaking bureau to lay out budgets and
basic policies.
Kan said the election victory by the DPJ, which has called for greater power
for elected officials over bureaucrats, signifies not just a transfer of power
from the Liberal Democratic Party to the DPJ but also a shift in power from
bureaucrats to politicians.
But Kan warned the novices not to let their guard down throughout their first
four-year terms and said there is a need to produce tangible results in that
period so they will not face a headwind in the next election.
PNP leader Kamei, 72, who heads a small party opposed to the privatization of
postal services, had requested the post of internal affairs and communications
minister, who has jurisdiction over postal services.
He received the offer of the post of state minister in charge of postal and
financial affairs a few hours after a PNP executive said that Kamei had been
asked to assume the post of defense minister and had accepted it. Hatoyama
later told reporters that the media reports about his nomination to the post of
defense minister were based on mere speculation.
The SDP's Fukushima, 53, who is set to become consumer affairs minister, had
initially sought a ministerial post in charge of employment issues but later
switched to seeking the post of environment minister.
Promoting employment and protecting the environment are two issues championed
by the SDP but her small party also advocates greater consumer protection.
Hatoyama has already decided to appoint DPJ Secretary General Katsuya Okada,
56, as foreign minister and Hatoyama's top aide, Hirofumi Hirano, 60, as chief
Cabinet secretary.
==Kyodo