Ignoring Women in Appointment

Maybe satisfied with the praises on his choice of five women in his new Cabinet, the number which tied the biggest record, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida made unbelievable choices in the selection of State Ministers and Parliamentary Vice-Ministers. Among 26 State Ministers and 28 Parliamentary Vice-Ministers, the number of women was zero. It obviously represents Kishida’s indifference to gender parity, even if he forgot his responsibility to appoint a woman. True reason is in the structure of the leading parties that has too little number of female lawmakers.

State Ministers and Parliamentary Vice-Ministers are the political appointees for each Ministries in the government of Japan. They support their Ministers and check the executive organizations from the political point of view. Regarded as the career paths for political leaders, the posts of State Ministers and Parliamentary Vice-Ministers are ordinarily occupied with young lawmakers with two to five terms.

 

Kishida Cabinet on Friday made the decision of naming those appointees, all of which were men. “The appointment of Ministers, State Ministers, Parliamentary Vice-Ministers and Advisors for Prime Minister with balance of age, gender and capabilities,” told Kishida to the press on the issue. He also emphasized the teamwork. The choices were made with consideration of relationship between Minister as a boss and its subordinates.

 

The result of zero woman was extreme, anyway. The selection would be made based on the recommendations from each faction. Kishida supposedly appointed strictly along with the lists, not requiring women on the list.

 

Kishida’s low consciousness on gender issue has been obvious in other ways. In the press conference right after the reshuffling the cabinet, Kishida expected new five female Ministers to work with “feminine sensibility and sympathy.” To his comment, a lot of comments appeared in the social networking service. “What is feminine sensibility?” “Desperately obsolete,” or “Prime Minister is not supposed to speak for encouraging gender bias,” were among them.

 

Japan’s extremely slow progress in gender equality, especially in politics, is well-known to the world. While the ratio of female lawmakers in both Houses of the Diet is 16%, LDP’s female lawmakers occupy 12% of all. Since most young female lawmakers have already experienced State Minister or Parliamentary Vice-Minister, it is reasonable that male would be occupying the posts, if they are distributed to the new faces. If he is unhappy with the accusations from the public, Kishida has to increase female lawmakers in his party, or select the appointee regardless their experiences.

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