Japan to pick new PM next week—ruling party

TOKYO—Japan’s center-left ruling party will choose a new leader next Monday to replace Naoto Kan as party president and therefore as prime minister, a senior party official said.

Kan, Japan’s fifth premier in five years, has been expected for weeks to announce his resignation amid stinging criticism over his response to the March 11 quake and tsunami disaster and the Fukushima nuclear crisis.

The August 29 election will be held on the condition that two bills – on bond issuance and renewable energy – which Kan has championed, pass this week, said Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) secretary general Katsuya Okada.

Parliament would most likely confirm the new premier on August 30.

Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda has been seen as the frontrunner to replace Kan, and Trade Minister Banri Kaieda, former transport minister Sumio Mabuchi and others have also thrown their hats into the ring.

However, the focus is now on whether former foreign minister Seiji Maehara, the public’s favorite according to opinion polls, will join the race. Jiji Press reported Monday that Maehara was preparing to run.

Whoever wins the premier’s job faces urgent challenges, chiefly the need to rebuild from Japan’s worst post-war disaster while keeping in check a public debt mountain that is twice the size of the economy.

Japan’s post-quake economic recovery has been threatened by global economic woes, market turmoil and the strength of the yen, which last week hit a new post-war high against the dollar, hurting Japanese exports.

The DPJ’s board members agreed on the date for the party meeting to allow for the timely passage of a third extra budget to finance disaster reconstruction and to allow for steps to tackle the strong yen, Okada said.

He also said that under this schedule the new prime minister will be able to send a new finance minister to a G7 meeting slated for early September.

The new DPJ president is set to become Japan’s next premier because the party controls the powerful lower house of the Diet. Parliament would be expected to confirm the new premier on August 30.