J Update

Former Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda  announced  his intention to run for the leader’s election of the Constitutional Democratic Party on September 23. Former Head of the CDP and former Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano has already announced his intention to run for it. Although incumbent Head Kenta Izumi has not officially announced his bid for reelection, it is possible that the race will not be contested by fresh people but by old faces. “I have made up my mind to challenge to be a prime minister,”  said  Noda to the press in front of JR Tsudanuma station, where he has been making speeches to the voters from the days of his freshman as the Diet member. His hope was running for the leader’s election of the CDP, grabbing a victory in it, leading the CDP to defeat ruling Liberal Democratic Party and sit on the seat of the prime minister. It will be a long way.   Noda raised cooperation among the opposition parties as the top priority in his campaign. “The bigg...

The Special Investigation Division of Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office   filed   summery indictment against a former member of the House of Representatives, Manabu Horii, with crime of not reporting political fund which he had received from Abe faction of the Liberal Democratic Party. Tokyo Summery Court ordered Horii 1 million yen of fine and three years of disfranchise.   The fourth indictment against lawmaker of the Liberal Democratic Party on the slush fund scandal reminds the public of inappropriate use of political funds in the party which is in a process of selecting new leader in the presidential election.   Horii failed in recording 17 million yen of income, which he received from Abe faction as the kickback of fundraising parties, to his political funds report between 2019 and 2021. Horii illegally used the fund for condolence money or flower to 52 people in his electoral district in Hokkaido, which amounted to 610 thousand yen. It is prohibited for...

Anti-Japan incidents by the Chinese are consecutively reported in Japan. It was reported that a Chinese man left a graffiti on the property of Yasukuni Shrine. A Chinese staff for NHK radio news distortedly read a news with a comment which was not in the text. They may reflect deteriorating relationship between Japan and China, as seen in the diplomatic channel of them.   A graffiti was found on a stone pillar of Yasukuni Shrine in June, which read “toilet” in red paint.  A Chinese man was arrested  in July with suspicion of destruction of property and the police obtained warrant for arrest of two other Chinese, who were supposed to get back to China. Chinese police announced in August that it was interviewing one of the two men with suspicion of another crime, without referring to the incident of Yasukuni.   In a radio news program of NHK in Chinese language on August 19, an outsourced staff read the news of arresting the Chinese on graffiti in Yasukuni with his own...

As it reaches the presidential election a month ahead, the Liberal Democratic Party reveals its fundamental structure of depending on factions which caused fatal scandal for Fumio Kishida administration over management of political fund. While some possible candidates for its presidential election uphold strict measures against the lawmakers who were involved in the slush fund scandal, others indicate generous treatment on them, expecting their votes in the election. The party is exposed to criticisms of the opposition parties.   In his press conference announcing running for the president on August 26, Digital Minister Taro Kono  required  the lawmakers who had accepted secret fund to return the same amount of money to be registered as an official candidate of the LDP in next election of both Houses of the Diet. “It is hard to be understood (by the public) that putting a period on the scandal by simply correcting papers,” said Kono. He indicated that the returned money w...

Ministry of Defense  announced  that a Chinese military aircraft violated Japan’s territorial airspace offshore Nagasaki prefecture in the morning of August 26. It was the first time that Japan confirmed Chinese military aircraft violating Japan’s territorial airspace. While the ministry assesses what was China’s intention of the violation, the news media assumes it as warning Japan of its security enhancement with like-minded nations. The ministry revealed that a Y-9 transport aircraft of Chinese military, used for collecting information,  violated  Japan’s air territory offshore Danjo Islands, Nagasaki, on 11:29 a.m. of August 26 and exited on 11:31 a.m. The aircraft flew from East China Sea to Kyushu Island of Japan, circling offshore the islands before entering Japan’s territory and flew to the direction of China’s mainland.   The Air Self-defense Force of Japan made a scrambling of fighter jets and warned the Chinese aircraft with Chinese and English langua...

Polls conducted by news organizations showed top three contenders in presidential election of the Liberal Democratic Party: former Secretary General Shigeru Ishiba, former Minister of Environment Shinjiro Koizumi and Minister for Economic Security Sanae Takaichi. While the order was drawn by public popularity, it is usual that LDP presidential election brings different result. It is still unclear how the race is going. To the question about who would be preferable for next president of the LDP, 21 percent of the responders answered it would be Ishiba, and another 21 percent upheld Koizumi in  the poll of  Asahi Shimbun . Takaichi followed them with 8 percent. Minister for Foreign Affairs Yoko Kamikawa and Minister for Digital Affairs Taro Kono received 6 percent, and Former Minister for Economic Security Takayuki Kobayashi got 5 percent.   LDP Secretary General Toshimitsu Motegi, former Minister on Measures for Declining Birth Rate Seiko Noda, Chief Cabinet Secretary (CCS...

The Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) will hold presidential election on September 23. As incumbent head of the party, Kenta Izumi, hopes to be reelected for his second term, former heads are gathering support from its lawmakers, indicating frustration against political handlings of Izumi. It will be a contest for presenting an alternative to current administration led by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) which will have presidential election four days after CDP.   Elected for the head after a defeat in general election of the House of Representatives three years ago, Izumi has been leading CDP trying to change the party from the one always opposing to everything the leading party does to a new opposition party that makes constructive proposals.   The result was changing almost nothing. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida did not much applied CDP’s arguments to his policies. In the important policies such as increasing defense budget or managing declining birth rate, CDP did not...

Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) started the process of retrieving debris, which were made by melted-down fuel rod and other substances, in Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (F1) for the first time since its severe accident in 2011. However, TEPCO stopped its process immediately after starting it, finding a mistake in the process. TEPCO postponed the project for identifying the reason of mistake and will not restart the process until it takes preventive measures. Soaked in great tsunami produced by the East Japan Great Earthquake in March 11, 2011, F1 lost all of its electric power, causing overheat of fuel rods which were melted down. 880 metric tons of debris still exist on the bottom of unit 1 to 3 of the plant. Having confirmed the situation inside the containment vessels, TEPCO decided to start retrieval this summer.   According to  the plan  of TEPCO, the retrieval would be started from the unit 2, in which  preparation has been relatively progress...

The Liberal Democratic Party decided that it would have its presidential election on September 27. While the rules for presidential election requires each candidates endorsement from twenty party lawmakers, eleven people are listed up by news organizations as possible contenders regardless they would be successful in achieving that endorsement. It is likely that internal struggle for getting majority votes will be heated up. At the time of announcement of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida for not running in the next LDP presidential election, there were only a few names for possible candidates. Former Minister of Defense and former LDP Secretary General Shigeru Ishiba was the top runner, because he had always been the first choice for next prime minister in the polls of news organizations. LDP Secretary General Toshimitsu Motegi was another choice as he had been indicating his running for the president.   In his press conference for announcing stepping down, Kishida hoped the election w...

The Supreme Court dismissed both appeals of plaintiffs and defendants in the case policemen excluded the protesters against then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe from the audience of his campaign rally on the street in Sapporo, Hokkaido, in 2019. Although the court decided that the exclusion of a man had been appropriate, it found that removal of a woman by police officers had been violating her freedom of expression and Hokkaido Prefectural Police been responsible for it. The police will have to revise its way of guarding politically important person. The plaintiffs are Masae Osugi and Kio Momoi. They were at the public rally of the Liberal Democratic Party, with attendance of Abe as a speaker, for the election of the House of Councillors at downtown Sapporo in July 2019. When they chanted “Step down, Abe” or “No tax increase” while Abe was making his speech, policemen of Hokkaido Prefectural Police removed them from the cloud.   Article 4 of  Police Duties Execution Act  deter...

Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) started the process for unprecedented denial of resumption of a reactor of nuclear power plant owned by Japan Atomic Power Company (JAPC). JAPC has received payment for maintenance of its facilities from local power companies, despite supplying no electric power. Having no reactor operating, it is skeptical that the profit is appropriate income of a power company.   JAPC was established in 1957 as a company, with investment of nine domestic major power companies, for wholesaling electric power produced by nuclear power generation. Among JAPC’s four reactors, one in Tokai Nuclear Power Plant in Ibaraki and #1 in Tsuruga Nuclear Power Plant in Fukui are in the process of dismantlement. Reactor #2 in Tsuruga and another in Tokai Daini Nuclear Power Plant stopped their operation after the severe accident in Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.   NRA concluded in July that the reactor #2 in Tsuruga would not pass the safety regulation for resump...

An experts’ meeting of Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) approved revised draft of the report on literature survey about location of final disposal site for high-level radioactive nuclear waste in two municipalities in Hokkaido. Although the ministry hopes to proceed to the second stage of outline survey, which includes boring survey, it is still unclear whether the ministry will be able to achieve approval from of the governor of Hokkaido, whose consent is necessary for the next stage. The meeting released  the first draft  of a final report of literature survey in February. The survey was conducted about the town of Suttsu and village of Kamoenai from 2020. Both are located on the western Hokkaido, facing the Sea of Japan. The draft indicated that whole town of Suttsu and a part of Kamoenai could be candidates for proceeding to the next stage of survey.   The revised draft was made with further discussion by the experts. They concluded that whole area of th...

Osaka High Court  decided  to open a criminal trial against a public prosecutor who had been alleged to have abused a suspect with insulting words. The court accepted the request of the suspect who had been found innocent. It will be the first time for a public prosecutor to stand trial on its fault in investigation. The point of the trial is expected not to be a personal failure but structural problem of public prosecutors’ office. The request of opening a trial was submitted by former president of a real estate firm in Osaka, Shinobu Yamagishi. Yamagishi was  arrested  with suspicion of being an accomplice of embezzlement in business by the Special Investigation Division of Osaka Public Prosecutors Office in December 2019. A chief director of an educational corporation borrowed 1.8 billion yen from Yamagishi and paid back with asset of the corporation.   Yamagishi was in custody for 248 days. According to the request for trial, a prosecutor who interviewed to ...

Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare released  Monthly Labor Survey  for June 2024, which indicated that real wage of workers in Japan turned to a plus for the first time in these twenty-seven months. Total cash earnings in real wage in June 2024 marked 143.0, compared to the average in 2020 as 100, marking 1.1 percent of surplus from the same period of previous year. For some disappointments, the surplus is recognized as a temporary phenomenon caused by change of salary system. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has been making effort to achieve positive cycle of consumption price and wage and urging business sectors to raise workers’ wage as much as possible. Although the wage marked 5 percent of increase in the spring labor negotiation this year, price inflation caused by unstable security situation in Ukraine or Palestine or depreciation of Japanese yen offset the increase of wage.   However, total cash earnings in June 2024 marked 4.5 percent of increase, to 498,884 yen, ...

Announcement of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s standing down brought skepticisms on continuation of main policies upheld by his administration. While Kishida promoted issues in diplomacy, security, economy and domestic affairs these three years, those can be deadlocked in half way. It is unclear Kishida’s policies will be succeeded by next prime minister elected in the presidential election next month. “Based on firm alliance between Japan and the United States, I led international discussion for cooperation in the world facing divisions and promoted diversified diplomacy, achieving major outcomes,” said Kishida in his press conference. Diplomacy is the issue Kishida has been most focused on, based on his experience of Minister for Foreign Affairs for five years.   The culmination of Kishida’s diplomacy was taking chairmanship in G7 Summit in Hiroshima in 2023. As a lawmaker elected from Hiroshima, Kishida insisted on his agenda of making the world without nuclear weapons. However,...

The day after announcing his standing down as the president of Liberal Democratic Party, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida attended a ceremony for commemorating victims of the Second World War and gave a speech to maintain Japan as a peaceful state. In his  speech , Kishida did not refer to controversial issues such as responsibility of Japan for neighbor countries in the time of war. A lame duck prime minister began to spend days without ambitious agenda. Kishida was the sponsor of 79 th  National Memorial Ceremony for the War Dead, held with attendance of the Emperor Naruhito at the Nippon Budokan in Tokyo on August 15. It is was the day Emperor Hirohito of Showa announced surrender to the United Nations in 1945, which is remembered by most Japanese citizens as the day of ending the war.   “Here, before the souls of all who lost their lives, I offer my heartfelt prayers for their repose,” said Kishida in his speech, remembering many people victimized to atomic bombings in Hi...

U.S. Air Force  disclosed  the result of investigation on crash of a tilt rotor aircraft, CV-22 Osprey, in offshore Yakushima, Kagoshima, last November. According to the investigation, the crash was caused by a mixed failure, which was brought by a crack of metal gear and decision of a pilot who continued the flight regardless the warning. The serious accident of the aircraft, which has been receiving skepticisms on its safety, further amplified the doubt on the deployment in Japan. A CV-22 Osprey assigned to Yokota Air Base in Tokyo disappeared from the radar in the afternoon of November 29, 2023, and its wreckage was found in the sea off Yakushima Island, Kagoshima, causing deaths of eight crew members. The aircraft was on its way from Iwakuni Air Base in Yamaguchi to Kadena Air Base in Okinawa. It was the most fatal accident of Osprey, since its deployment to Japan in 2012.   The report  released by U.S. Air Force Special Operations Command indicated that the acci...