ID :
158399
Sat, 01/29/2011 - 23:34
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https://www.oananews.org//node/158399
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Japanese PM called to quit if 2011 budget not passed
TOKYO, Jan. 29 Kyodo - A senior ruling coalition lawmaker said Saturday that Prime Minister Naoto Kan should step down if the fiscal 2011 budget fails to clear parliament by the April 1 start of the new fiscal year.
The comment by People's New Party Secretary General Mikio Shimoji could prove to be politically provocative given that there is no guarantee that budget-related bills will be passed in the divided parliament, where the opposition controls one of the bicameral chambers.
The House of Representatives, which is controlled by Kan's Democratic Party of Japan, has superiority over the opposition-dominated House of Councillors in passing a budget, but not for other budget-related bills which must also clear the Diet in order to put the budget in force.
''If the prime minister of a country cannot succeed in having a budget clear in March, he should naturally quit,'' Shimoji said at a meeting of his party's Okinawa chapter in the city of Naha, Okinawa Prefecture.
He also suggested that the DPJ-People's New Party coalition should seek to realign with the Social Democratic Party, which left the coalition last May over policy differences, to have the budget-related legislation enacted.
If the SDP rejoins the coalition, the grouping will regain a two-thirds majority in the lower house, which will enable the coalition to enact legislation rejected by the upper house.
Meanwhile, national policy minister Koichiro Gemba indicated the same day that the ruling camp may consult with the opposition over possible revisions to the fiscal 2011 budget and related bills it has submitted to parliament.
''We must create the momentum for talks'' between the ruling and opposition parties, he told reporters in Ushiku, Ibaraki Prefecture, referring to the absence of four opposition parties, including the largest Liberal Democratic Party, from deliberations that began Friday in the lower house Budget Committee.
The opposition parties have criticized the DPJ for scheduling the start of the deliberations without their agreement at a meeting of Budget Committee executives on Thursday.
Other DPJ lawmakers, including Secretary General Katsuya Okada, leveled criticism at or called for cooperation from the opposition parties following their boycott of the budget deliberations.
''They had no major reasons for not attending (the meeting) from the outset,'' Okada said in Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture, indicating that the DPJ would go ahead with deliberations on Monday without the opposition.
Also Saturday, Yoshimi Watanabe, head of Your Party, which is among the other small opposition parties that were absent from the deliberations, vowed to ''do our utmost to force the Kan Cabinet into resignation and have it dissolve the lower house for a general election during this regular Diet session'' through June.
At its first party congress since its founding in the summer of 2009 held in Tokyo, the party accused the Kan government of ''trying to extend its life by sharing a tax-increase policy line with the LDP,'' and vowed to prevent a consumption tax hike.
The comment by People's New Party Secretary General Mikio Shimoji could prove to be politically provocative given that there is no guarantee that budget-related bills will be passed in the divided parliament, where the opposition controls one of the bicameral chambers.
The House of Representatives, which is controlled by Kan's Democratic Party of Japan, has superiority over the opposition-dominated House of Councillors in passing a budget, but not for other budget-related bills which must also clear the Diet in order to put the budget in force.
''If the prime minister of a country cannot succeed in having a budget clear in March, he should naturally quit,'' Shimoji said at a meeting of his party's Okinawa chapter in the city of Naha, Okinawa Prefecture.
He also suggested that the DPJ-People's New Party coalition should seek to realign with the Social Democratic Party, which left the coalition last May over policy differences, to have the budget-related legislation enacted.
If the SDP rejoins the coalition, the grouping will regain a two-thirds majority in the lower house, which will enable the coalition to enact legislation rejected by the upper house.
Meanwhile, national policy minister Koichiro Gemba indicated the same day that the ruling camp may consult with the opposition over possible revisions to the fiscal 2011 budget and related bills it has submitted to parliament.
''We must create the momentum for talks'' between the ruling and opposition parties, he told reporters in Ushiku, Ibaraki Prefecture, referring to the absence of four opposition parties, including the largest Liberal Democratic Party, from deliberations that began Friday in the lower house Budget Committee.
The opposition parties have criticized the DPJ for scheduling the start of the deliberations without their agreement at a meeting of Budget Committee executives on Thursday.
Other DPJ lawmakers, including Secretary General Katsuya Okada, leveled criticism at or called for cooperation from the opposition parties following their boycott of the budget deliberations.
''They had no major reasons for not attending (the meeting) from the outset,'' Okada said in Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture, indicating that the DPJ would go ahead with deliberations on Monday without the opposition.
Also Saturday, Yoshimi Watanabe, head of Your Party, which is among the other small opposition parties that were absent from the deliberations, vowed to ''do our utmost to force the Kan Cabinet into resignation and have it dissolve the lower house for a general election during this regular Diet session'' through June.
At its first party congress since its founding in the summer of 2009 held in Tokyo, the party accused the Kan government of ''trying to extend its life by sharing a tax-increase policy line with the LDP,'' and vowed to prevent a consumption tax hike.
