Prime Minister Of Japan

Prime Minister lauds joint VN-Japan initiative

The latest Japanese commitments to Vietnamese development are part of a joint initiative for which an action plan was signed yesterday following a meeting of the Joint Committee of the Viet Nam-Japan Joint Initiative.

Dung pledged full support for the freshly inked action plan during his meeting with Kato Susumu, president of the Japan-Viet Nam Economic Committee, under the Japan Federation of Economic Organisations (Keidanren).

He added that the Vietnamese Government was instructing relevant agencies to implement agreements reached by the two countries during the recent visit by Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan, which included the construction of a nuclear energy plant and joint exploitation of rare earth minerals.

Dung thanked the Japanese government for continuing its official development assistance to Viet Nam, even though it is having to overcome the economic and logistical hardships caused by recent natural disasters.

A strategic partnership signed by the two countries has seen Japan become one of the Viet Nam's biggest foreign investors and trade partners.

Susumu said the first three phases of the joint initiative, of which the latest aid is the fourth, had increased foreign investment in Viet Nam.

He pointed out that Japanese investors anticipated great improvements in Viet Nam's customs procedures at border gates and more effective use of public-private partnership agreements in the future.

On the same day, Politburo member and Permanent Secretary of the Communist Party of Viet Nam's Central Committee Truong Tan Sang said he highly valued the positive contributions made by the Viet Nam-Japan Economic Committee to the development of bilateral relations while receiving Chairman of the committee Susumu.

Sang affirmed Viet Nam's policy to improve the investment environment and create favourable conditions to attract both Japanese and international capital resources.

Susumo replied that the fourth period of the initiative would enhance Viet Nam's economic competitiveness.

ISN Blog » Who Is the Prime Minister of Japan, Again?

Naoto Kan passed a vote of no confidence last week after he had promised to step down soon. (Let’s keep aside the discussion of what he meant by “soon”.) His problem was not so much the opposition, who initiated the vote but only holds a minority of seats in the Lower House. Kan’s authority is challenged from within his own Democratic Party. Already the second prime minister since the party finally managed to take power in 2009, Kan is criticized for his handling of the triple catastrophe that hit Japan in March. (Again, let’s not argue whether the criticism is justified; after all, I want to make a more general argument.)

The Democratic Party holds a solid majority in the crucial Lower House and the next general elections are two years away. Then why is the ruling party so obsessed with changing its leadership? (A bad habit the DPJ seems to have inherited from its predecessor, the LDP .) One answer might be that Japanese politicians care much, probably too much, about opinion polls. Another possible answer is that there is a culture of demission: ministers are expected to step down in order to show responsibility for something that has happened or something they have done. While accountability is a necessary feature of a democratic political system, the threshold for demission seems far too low in Japan*.

Let’s have a look at one consequence of this culture of demission.

This illustration published on 26 May by the German quality-weekly “ Die Zeit ” shows a gathering of G8 leaders in spring 2011. Instead of Naoto Kan, who represented Japan at that meeting, the illustration shows a laughing Taro Aso . Yes, Taro Aso, who was Japan’s Prime Minister from September 2008 to August 2009. The illustration is not just based on an old photo; the illustrator cared to replace Gordon Brown by David Cameron (far right). However, he did not bother about Naoto Kan (Kan is already the second Prime Minister since Aso.)

A newspaper like “Die Zeit” should never make such a mistake. When a Japanese TV channel called, they apologized and replaced the illustration on their website with a photo . Yet, what stroke me is that Japanese commentators were not even annoyed by the paper’s mistake. Rather, they blamed their own politicians, in this case Naoto Kan, for not being visible and memorable enough overseas.

One part of the problem is that Japanese prime ministers may indeed seem colorless to outsiders, perhaps with the exception of Jun’ichiro Koizumi and Taro Aso. The other part of the problem, however, is that prime ministers change too quickly to stick to foreign journalists’ minds. Being remembered by journalists would be nice but is not a necessity. But I don’t think it will be easier for foreign leaders to remember who the Japanese Prime Minister was.

Prime Minister of Japan

The Life of Sir Harry Parkes: Minister plenipotentiary to Japan. by F. V. Dickens. Minister plenipotentiary to China by S. Lane-Poole

Leading Japan, the role of the prime minister

Prime Ministers of Japan, Prime Minister of Japan, Hideki Tojo, Ito Hirobumi, Junichiro Koizumi, Fumimaro Konoe, Katsura Taro, Toshiki Kaifu

Children of Prime Ministers of Japan, Yasuo Fukuda