The Liberal Democratic Party’s formal departure from decades of faction-based politics has raised questions about its real commitment to political reform and a break from old party politics.
The result of only two weeks of debate and hastily approved Thursday just before parliament convenes, the LDP's party reform interim report appears light on firm actions and risks leaving unpleasant repercussions inside the party.
Despite all the high-sounding talk and the apparent commitment to a new beginning, experts agree it would likely take longer than two weeks of hurried debate to eradicate what’s long been seen as a defining trait of the party.
At the center of the new report lies a reclassification of factions, with these downgraded to "policy groups" and formally deprived of their strong influence over government and party operations. Additionally, external scrutiny in their political-funds reports and tougher rules on political funding were introduced.
“We will strip the factions of their role in matters of personnel and money and therefore dismantle the so-called factions,” Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who’s also LDP president, said Tuesday as he addressed reporters at the party's headquarters in Tokyo.
However, as long as the party maintains its long-established practice of electing its leaders in party-wide elections every three years, there is no way it could get rid of factional influence on decisions over money and positions, said Koji Nakakita, a professor of political science at Chuo University.
“It looks like a very shallow solution to tackle declining popularity, one that doesn’t reflect the actual state of things,” said Nakakita, adding that the interim report doesn’t contain any serious consideration of how the party should be changed, for instance, with regard to the over-institutionalization of factions.
“To elect a president you need a majority, and to obtain a majority you need groups. Once a group is formed, you need money for social engagements and ceremonial occasions, and those personal bonds are reflected in personnel appointments when a president is chosen.”
Strong factionalism has characterized the LDP since its early days in the 1950s. Over the decades, factions became increasingly institutionalized, acting almost as separate parties competing with one another for party and government posts.
Former Prime Minister Masayoshi Ohira’s famous words that “When three people gather, two factions can be formed” — an evergreen phrase often used by the Japanese media when it comes to factions — speak of the intrinsic relevance of faction-driven politics in the LDP, and Japanese politics at large.
Besides offering a place to socialize and exchange ideas, factions have flooded their members with money for electoral purposes in exchange for loyalty to the leader in presidential elections. Successive corruption scandals have severely tainted their reputation, and the word "faction" has increasingly become a synonym for behind-the-scenes political maneuvering.
What would have Ohira thought had he known that the Kochikai — the faction he belonged to and chaired for nine years until his death in 1980 — had been dissolved for its involvement in a slush-funds scandal?
Unfortunately, we have no way of knowing.
What we do know, however, is that Kishida’s announcement that he would seek to dissolve the group he led for 11 years until December has triggered a chain reaction with few precedents in recent Japanese political history.
The latest kickback wrongdoings that led to the prosecution of the accountants of three factions for under-reporting political funds have exacerbated criticism of faction politics. That has prompted the prime minister, who has heavily relied on factions since taking power, to dismantle his own in the hope of restoring public trust and improving his standing.
After three LDP groups — the Kishida faction, the group previously led by former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the one led by former LDP Secretary-General Toshihiro Nikai — declared last week that they would shut down, things have moved rather fast.
But the initial conclusion of the LDP's internal review has failed to meet initial expectations.
Failing to address rising calls that a harder line had to be drawn, Thursday’s report doesn’t spell out the clear abolition of the groups. While it forbids the intervention of factions in party and government appointments, it doesn’t include penalties.
LDP Vice President Taro Aso and Secretary-General Toshimitsu Motegi — Kishida’s closest allies in the party and the heads of the second- and third-largest groups in the party, respectively — had long been reluctant to dissolve their own factions.
Overridden by Kishida’s announcement last Thursday, the two, largely untouched by the political fundraising scandal, repeatedly told the prime minister that they would think about the future of their factions on their own. They formally accepted stricter rules on the day-to-day operations of the groups, but pushed for a continuation of the faction system.
As a result, the Aso and Motegi factions will continue to exist as the largest and second-largest policy groups and submit political funds reports. The faction led by LDP General Council Chairman Hiroshi Moriyama, the party’s smallest with eight members, officially disbanded Thursday.
Kishida in turn hasn’t benefited from his audacious gambit.
Polls have shown that, while the public welcomes his decision to dissolve his faction, his approval ratings haven’t gone up significantly. The prime minister remains deeply unpopular and it might take more than such stopgap solutions to restore long-gone confidence in the administration.
The party remains in a state of confusion at the moment, unable to agree on the future of its groups.
“I think we all had the impression that today's discussion was a bit more backward-looking than forward-looking,” former Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera, who is a senior member of the Kishida faction, told reporters Tuesday.
“The worst thing we can do is give the impression that we are just replacing the signboard,” said lawmaker Hajime Funada, a Motegi faction member.
Under the new regulations, factions won’t be allowed to host fundraising parties, and groups that break the law will be forced to disband. However, a loophole will still allow faction heavyweights to organize parties and return the collected funds to lawmakers.
“After all, factions are not 'policy groups,’ they are more like mutual aid organizations for lawmakers,” said Nakakita, adding that, as a result of the new regulations, the power of the party's executive leadership will eventually grow.
In another crucial development, the party will in the upcoming weeks reportedly discuss potential penalties for the five former executive members of the Abe faction dismissed from government and party posts in December. The matter will likely become a topic of discussion during the upcoming session of parliament, starting Friday and running for 150 days until late June.
In parliament, opposition parties might find some common ground in advocating for wide-reaching political reform, including tougher rules for lawmakers involved in slush fund practices — even if indirectly.
In this regard, Kishida told reporters Thursday that the party’s focus should be on ensuring clear accountability for those involved and understanding what happened.
But, as shown in past examples of political reform, stringent rules on political funding will hardly be enough to prevent a resurrection of factional politics in the LDP. While new regulations will end up affecting their fundraising capabilities and influence on party appointments, the groups will make a comeback the moment an opportunity presents itself, Nakakita says.
“The focus is totally wrong, this is an issue of money-politics,” he said. “If not as factions, they will revive as groups. That’s obvious.”
Asked about how he intends to take responsibility as a long-time chairman of the Kishida faction, he referred to his decision to dissolve the group and expressed his determination to lead the party’s efforts to restore trust from the public.
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