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Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama resigns after eight months; Fourth failed PM in less than four years admits "many shortcomings"
By Finfacts Team
Jun 2, 2010 - 6:21:42 AM
Outgoing Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama at the Ceremony of Reverence at Chidorigafuchi National Cemetery, Tokyo, Monday, May 31,2010.
Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama announced Wednesday he will resign after eight months in power. He is the fourth failed PM in less than four years and admitted "many shortcomings."
"I'm going to step down," Hatoyama announced at a live broadcast on Japanese television NHK, while addressing party members of both the upper and lower houses of the Diet, Japan's parliament. "I have had many shortcomings, I have been allowed to lead all of you for the past eight months to today. I am extremely grateful for having been given this opportunity," he said.
Just eight months ago, Hatoyama's Democratic Party of Japan won a sweeping victory, ousting the corrupt Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which had governed the country with just one short interlude since 1955. However, the new prime minister was soon dogged by allegations of illegal campaign financing - - Hatoyama had received ¥15-million (US$170,000) a month from his mother to support his political activities - - together with an investigation of party founder and former LDP stalwart, Ichiro Ozawa, tarnished the new government.
Besides, Hatoyama, the grandson of a prime minister (like Ireland, nepotism is very strong in the political system) who has a Ph.D in engineering from Stanford University, was not viewed as an inspiring leader, which earned him the nickname “alien.”
The trigger for his resignation was the decision under US pressure to break his pre-election promise to move a US Marine base off the island of Okinawa, where most of America's Pacific forces are based. Last month, terming his decision "heartbreaking," he announced that the base would remain on Okinawa, although relocated to a different part of the island.
Hatoyama said today that that while he did lose public trust, he hopes future generations will remember his legacy.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I have often been dubbed as an alien and how I understand this is that I see not current Japan but always try to see future Japan," he said.
"Local government, local communities should be the main actors," said Hatoyama.
"In five or ten years people of Japan will understand what I am talking about."
Japan has endured two lost decades of low growth with more than one-third of its workforce on temp status, earning less than the Irish minimum wage.
Its broken political system, riddled with cronyism and an entrenched bureaucracy, has failed to respond to a rising gross public debt of over 200% of GDP (gross domestic product), ageing population and plunging savings rate
Luca Silipo, chief economist at Natixis, says from an economic policy standpoint, the action taken by the DPJ government was "shallow". He tells CNBC's Karoi Enjoji and Martin Soong that Hatoyama failed to make necessary structural changes to Japan's economy:
