The government and the Democratic Party of Japan have decided to let Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda appoint the five members of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission without the consent of the Diet.
This unusual way of appointing the NRC members will only deepen the public's distrust of the nation's regulatory control of nuclear power generation and the power industry.
The government and the DPJ have resorted to a supplementary clause of the law to establish the NRC. The clause allows the prime minister to appoint the NRC members and to skip the Diet's approval if he cannot get Diet approval because the Diet is out of session or because the Lower House has been dissolved.