The key to getting bills and personnel appointments through the divided Diet is "patience," says Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura.
Since the inauguration of Yasuo Fukuda's first Cabinet last September, Machimura has been the prime minister's right-hand man. But with the opposition-controlled Upper House rejecting key bills and appointments, it has been a trying 10 months for Machimura.
"I had to use an enormous amount of energy for (this divided Diet)," Machimura said during an interview this week after he was reappointed as the government's top spokesman. "It was beyond my imagination that the opposition parties would oppose so many (bills) — for reasons I still don't understand."