Reuters leads the way on Japanese politics

Since the new government took office last September, concerns have weighed on Japanese share and bond prices about whether Japan’s ruling coalition, led by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama’s novice Democratic Party, can speak with one voice, take steps to prop up the economy and keep a lid on public debt. A perception that the government is mismanaging ties with the United States has triggered geopolitical uncertainty and eroded popular support for Hatoyama.

In a series of January interviews, Reuters Tokyo demonstrated the reach and authority of its coverage of the new political scene by speaking to the head of the opposition Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), the leader of a small ruling coalition party punching above its weight and Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada – currently in the hot seat of a feud with Washington over a U.S. airbase. LDP leader Sadakzau Tanigaki zeroed in on the Democrats’ weak spot, its struggle with the need to keep public spending under control, but admitted that the long-dominant LDP faced a tough battle to revive voter trust ahead of the upper house election.

Social Democratic Party leader Mizuho Fukushima stuck to her stance of calling for the relocation of the U.S. airbase outside Okinawa Island, but in comments that may have provided some relief for Hatoyama, she stopped short of threatening to leave the ruling coalition over the issue. The Democrats need the support of her party and another small coalition partner to pass laws smoothly through the upper house, until and unless they can win an outright majority in the mid-year poll.

Foreign Minister Okada shrugged off concerns that Tokyo was snuggling up to China at the expense of its close ally Washington, dismissed worries the base feud was eroding public support for Hatoyama, and vowed again that Japan would decide how to resolve the seemingly intractable dispute by May.