Japan's new PM to tap Taro Aso, former prime minister, for finance post

Shinzo Abe, elected Japan's news prime minister, will offer the finance minster's job to Taro Aso, a former prime minister and Liberal Democratic Party veteran. 

|
Alessia Pierdomenico/Reuters/File
Taro Aso, then Japanese Prime Minister, looks on during a bilateral meeting in Rome in 2009. Japan's new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has decided to appoint Aso, a veteran lawmaker from the Liberal Democratic Party, as finance minister, the Asahi newspaper reported.

Japan's next Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will offer the finance minister's job to Taro Aso, media said, a veteran lawmaker and former prime minister expected to toe the party line calling for aggressive monetary easing and a public works splurge.

Asahi and Mainichi newspapers reported on Tuesday Aso would get the finance post while Yomiuri said Aso, 72, was also being considered as a possible foreign minister.

Abe, whose Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its small ally New Komeito captured a two-thirds majority in Sunday's landslide, will announce his cabinet line-up on Dec. 26.

The choice of Aso suggests that Abe is looking to LDP veterans to fill important positions to avoid criticism that his ministers lack experience, a recurring complaint about cabinets of the Democratic Party of Japan that trounced the LDP in 2009, only to suffer a crushing defeat three years later.

Abe's own first cabinet similarly suffered criticism that he picked lawmakers close to him personally rather than those best qualified for the job.

When Aso was prime minister, he launched massive economic stimulus packages to combat the 2008-2009 financial crisis, but his efforts were overshadowed by gaffes, scandals and policy flip-flops that culminated with the LDP losing power after more than half a century of an almost non-stop rule.

 Like Abe, Aso has an elite political lineage and like the next premier is a grandson of a prime minister.

Abe, who quit abruptly in 2007 after just one year in office, says he has learned from past mistakes and has been working hard to project an image of a strong, mature and decisive leader.

Buoyed by the election victory, which political analysts saw more as voters' payback for the Democrats' troubled rule than a full embrace of the LDP, Abe has swiftly moved to press his agenda.

On Monday, he turned up the heat on the Bank of Japan to boost its monetary stimulus when it ends its two-day meeting on Thursday and pressing it to adopt a more ambitious 2 percent inflation target as soon as next month.

On Tuesday, Abe told reporters that he had agreed in a telephone call with U.S. President Barack Obama that the two would try to meet next month, part of a push to strengthen ties with Washington and give Japan a greater global security role.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Japan's new PM to tap Taro Aso, former prime minister, for finance post
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Latest-News-Wires/2012/1217/Japan-s-new-PM-to-tap-Taro-Aso-former-prime-minister-for-finance-post
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe