Miyazaki guv edging closer to Diet run?

THERE ARE SIGNS that fave rave Miyazaki Governor Higashikokubaru Hideo is edging closer to running in the upcoming lower house election for the Diet. (Hit the Search engine on the left sidebar to access the many articles on this site about the former bad-boy comedian turned pol.)

Though he’s been in office fewer than two years and has repeatedly said that he is committed to his current job, the governor hasn’t ruled out the possibility of shifting his political focus to the national stage.

His decision has been made easier now that a path has been cleared out for him to make the run. Nakayama Nariaki, who lasted only five days as the Minister of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport in the Aso Taro Cabinet after some rather ill-advised remarks, formally announced that he will not stand for office in the upcoming election. Mr. Nakayama represents Miyazaki District #1, which means that the governor won’t have to start hopping around the country to find a suitable seat and can plausibly keep his promise to work for the prefecture and its citizens.

Here’s what the vernacular edition of the Asahi Shimbun quoted the governor as telling reporters this weekend:

“If the Liberal Democratic Party doesn’t field a candidate, the only choice will be between the Democratic Party and the Communist Party. I wonder how that would be for Miyazaki Prefecture…I received a mandate from the prefecture’s citizens, and my job is governor. But if the prefecture’s citizens, the prefecture assembly, and the prefecture employees told me to put my nose to the grindstone at the national level, I’d discuss it with them.”

Mr. Higashikokubaru also made an interesting observation:

“With the Cabinet minister resigning, it’s the same type of situation when I ran for office after the previous governor was arrested. This area is behind even the rest of Kyushu, and it would be detrimental for Miyazaki if no one stepped forward, either to assume the role of the minister or for the party.”

The prefectural party chapter doesn’t necessarily see it the same way, however. They plan to hold an open solicitation for candidates for the open seat in District #1. They admit they’re considering the governor as a candidate, but the chairman said that even if party headquarters recommended Mr. Higashikokubaru, they have their own rules. He said they will accept applications from prospective candidates from 7 to 15 October, and the election committee would vote for a candidate on the 18th.

But one member of the chapter contradicted the chairman, telling the press that if party headquarters wanted the governor, they couldn’t refuse. Meanwhile, other reports have national LDP officials saying they would have Mr. Higashikokubaru run as an independent to facilitate his election and not ruffle the feathers of the prefecture’s voters.

The opposition DPJ would surely have been licking their chops over the prospect of going up against the wounded Mr. Nakayama, but now the possibility of having to take on a man with stratospheric approval ratings must have them worried. Speaking in Omuta, Fukuoka (Aso Taro’s old stomping grounds) on the 4th, DPJ Secretary General Hatoyama Yukio had this to say:

“Prefectural citizens won’t have a high opinion of a governor who gives up his job in the middle of his first term. If he runs for a seat at the national level, the disappointment would be incalculable.”

Mr. Hatoyama added:

“He’s been doing a great job of promoting Miyazaki, but it is the wish of the prefecture’s citizens that he must still perform important work as the governor of the prefecture.”

One wonders when Mr. Hatoyama became such an expert on local Miyazaki politics and why the people of Fukuoka should care one way or the other, but he became the political equivalent of wallpaper long ago, so it doesn’t make much difference anyway. Few people even in the party he helped found listen to him any more—least of all latecomer party boss Ozawa Ichiro.

Some encouraging words for Governor Higashikokubaru came from another recently minted governor, Hashimoto Toru of Osaka. Mr. Hashimoto was an attorney by profession, but became nationally known through his appearances on a popular television program that presented discussions of legal issues in an entertaining way.

His message? Run, baby, run!

“Governor Higashikokubaru should definitely run if he has the backing of the prefectural citizens, because he’s working so hard for his prefecture. If he’ll do it for the sake of Miyazaki, I hope he gives it everything he’s got.”

There’s one man who must be dismayed by all this talk: former bureaucrat Kawamura Hidesaburo. Mr. Kawamura ran for Miyazaki governor last year with the backing of the DPJ and some elements of the LDP, but Mr. Higashikokubaru trounced him and a third candidate in the election. He’d already decided to run for the Diet seat from Miyazaki #1 against Mr. Nakayama as an independent, again with DPJ backing.

Now, instead of the disgraced former Cabinet minister, he might wind up having to face the most popular politician at the local level in Japan for the second year running.

Update: This is becoming a hot story–a possible Higashikokubaru candidacy is the lead article on the first page of this morning’s Nishinippon Shimbun.

Update 2: Now the Asahi is reporting that it’s starting to look as if the governor will give the next Diet election a pass to stick around for a full term. He gave a speech in Miyazaki yesterday, and repeated that “as of now” he has no plans to run. More important, he met with a support group after the speech and later said that most of them want him to complete at least one term as the governor. Mr. Higashikokubaru has said that he will respect the wishes of his constituents when making his decision. He also confirmed that the LDP has been in contact with his support group about a possible candidacy.

Nevertheless, an eventual run for a Diet seat now seems inevitable. He admitted that he will probably do so in the future, and gave as his reason the difficulty a prefectural governor faces in effecting change in the way the national government deals with local government.