Japanese PM Signals Intention to Step Down at LDP Convention

Embattled Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori on Tuesday signaled his intention to step down to members of his ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) by proposing to bring forward the LDP presidential election slated for September.

"We should bring forward the party presidential race scheduled for this fall. The exact timing and method of the election should be subject of further discussions," Mori said at a party convention held at the Nippon Budokan hall in Tokyo.

Mori was repeating a compromise deal reached with five senior LDP leaders in private last Saturday -- that he will indicate his intention to quit, but will stay in office for several more weeks, until the fiscal 2001 budget is enacted by the parliament.

The Japanese prime minister did not make a clear-cut announcement, as he did last Saturday, to avoid appearing to be a political lame duck ahead of meetings with US President George W.Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin later this month.

Four opposition parties and a parliamentary group, meanwhile, demanded that Mori resign immediately, in a non-binding censure motion against Mori submitted to the House of Councilors on Tuesday morning.

The Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), the Liberal Party (LP), the Japanese Communist Party (JCP), the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and others, submitted the motion, saying that Mori's ambiguous remarks are an insult to the public.

Despite that Mori has continued to insist in public that he has not voiced his intention to resign, LDP power brokers have begun preparations for Mori's quit.

The LDP executives plan to hold a party president election in April at the earliest to select a new party leader in a vote by party lawmakers and one representative from each of its 47 prefectural chapters.

The winner would become the next Japanese prime minister because the LDP and its two coalition partners, the New Komeito party and the New Conservative Party (NCP), hold a majority in the powerful House of Representatives, which has final say in selecting a premier.

Among possible candidates for Mori's successor are former LDP Secretary General Hiromu Nonaka and former Health and Welfare Minister Junichiro Koizumi, the nominal head of Mori's faction in the LDP.

Mori has been under intense pressure to step down from ruling bloc lawmakers who are worried they will take a beating in July's House of Councilors election if the unpopular prime minister stays in office.

Public support for Mori's cabinet, which were at the 40 percent level when Mori took office in April last year, has plunged to the single digit in recent surveys after a year of verbal blunders and scandals.

Mori sparked criticism last month for continuing a golf game after being informed of a collision between the Japanese fisheries training ship Ehime Maru and a U.S. Navy submarine. The accident left nine Japanese, including four 17-year-old high students, missing.






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