Five challenges facing Japan's new PM Ishiba

TOKYO — Shigeru Ishiba will face five key challenges when he becomes Japan's new prime minister on Tuesday after being voted leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).

Security threats

Nerves are running high over China's increasingly aggressive moves in the region, following the first confirmed incursion by a Chinese military aircraft into Japanese airspace in August.

Other incidents have soured relations since then, including the fatal stabbing of a Japanese schoolboy in Shenzhen.

Security policy expert Ishiba wants to boost Japan's defense capabilities and proposes an "Asian NATO" to counter threats including North Korean missile tests.

He also wants a more equal alliance with the United States -- "but there is no need to hyperventilate about the prospects for dramatic change" in defense policy, said Nicholas Szechenyi of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"The rapidly deteriorating security environment in Asia favors more security cooperation with the United States and other partners," he said.

LDP scandals

Outgoing Prime Minister Fumio Kishida had record-low approval ratings, partly due to scandals over party funding and lawmakers' links to the Unification Church.

Ishiba, who intends to call a snap election for October 27, has pledged to make the LDP "a fair and just party" again.

James Brady of consulting firm Teneo said Ishiba's "ability to reflect the popular mood was evident earlier this year in his criticism of his party's response to the political funding scandal".

But a general election could also rehabilitate some disgraced party members, said Naofumi Fujimura, a professor at the Graduate School of Law at Kobe University.

"In Japan, if you win an election, you are considered to be purified," so some MPs "involved in the scandals may return to the public stage", he told AFP.

Lackluster economy

Sluggish consumption and wage growth have long been a drag on growth in Japan.

Ishiba backs the Bank of Japan's gradual move away from its maverick ultra-loose policies -- a stance that caused the yen to surge after his victory in the LDP vote, which in turn led Japanese stocks to tank on Monday.

His win "implies less pressure... for large-scale debt-funded spending or a return to monetary easing by the Bank of Japan", policies championed over a decade ago by assassinated ex-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, said Teneo's Brady.

To help the government's existing plan to ramp up defense spending to two percent of GDP by 2027, Ishiba has suggested a hike in corporate taxes.

Aging population

Japan has the world's oldest population after tiny Monaco, and its population aged 100 or older is at a record high of more than 95,000, recent data shows.

Ishiba aims to raise Japan's low birth rate through measures including a review of the country's notoriously long working hours, and expanding support for parents.

He has called the revitalization of rural regions -- where shrinking elderly communities are becoming increasingly isolated -- "my life's work" along with security and disaster prevention.

Climate policy

Japan is targeting carbon neutrality by 2050, and Ishiba wants to boost the use of renewables to fuel resource-poor Japan, alongside nuclear power -- still a delicate issue after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011.

The E3G think tank ranks Japan in last place -- by some distance -- among G7 nations on efforts to reduce emissions from their power systems, with the highest reliance on fossil fuels.

Economist and former Bank of Japan board member Sayuri Shirai told AFP that Japan needs to focus more on decarbonization strategies, especially in business.

"If Japanese companies don't do that, they will lose out to global competition" because high-carbon emission goods could be punished with taxes and tariffs, she said.

© 2024 AFP