Former prime ministers (from left) Taro Aso, Yoshihide Suga, and Fumio Kishida leave a meeting with Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, at LDP headquarters on July 23..
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Just coming to light, this is the inside story of the July 23 meeting at Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) headquarters. In the room were Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba (LDP president) and three former prime ministers: Chief Advisor Taro Aso, LDP Vice President Yoshihide Suga, and Ishiba's immediate predecessor, former Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
Although Ishiba reiterated after the meeting that he would remain in office, he was in fact urged to step down. The discrepancy between his statement and reality reflects a divergence in thinking.
While the Prime Minister seeks to prolong the life of his administration, Aso and others aim to pave the way for his resignation and take control of the next political phase.
Aso Confronts Ishiba
It was 2:00 PM on April 23 in the President's Office at LDP headquarters in Nagatacho.
Party elder and former leader Taro Aso and the others sat across from a visibly tense Ishiba, still reeling from a crushing defeat in the July 20 Upper House election.
Aso, the most senior figure in the room, opened the discussion about the Prime Minister's resignation. "Ishiba's LDP can't win elections anymore," Aso said. "We need to address this."
Demand for Clarity
Kishida followed: "It's important to review the election. But the party won't survive unless it clearly states what it intends to do with the administration." He was responding to Ishiba's desire for time to reflect on the Upper House results.
Aso agreed, saying, "Kishida is right."
Ishiba's relationship with the three former prime ministers is marked by complexity. Aso has long harbored resentment toward Ishiba, who once pressured him to step down during his own time in office.
Kishida supported the Prime Minister in the September 2024 party leadership race. However, he has since grown distrustful, disappointed by Ishiba's failure to form a strong party lineup through appointments and his inability to deliver a clear message on economic and foreign policy.
Politics Beyond Will
Although Suga does not have a strained relationship with Ishiba, he remained reserved. He simply remarked, "It would be bad to split the party." This was in response to growing efforts within the LDP to gather signatures for a leadership recall and to convene a joint session of both houses of the Diet.
In politics, some currents cannot be resisted by personal will alone. When Suga was prime minister, he was forced to step down amid criticism over his handling of the COVID-19 outbreak.
Kishida, who had planned to run in the 2024 party leadership race, ended up taking responsibility for a political fund scandal involving unreported income within his faction.
Ishiba, by contrast, appears to be clinging to his position despite having lost two national elections. During the hour-and-20-minute meeting, it was hard to say whether Ishiba, Aso, or the others shared a sense of urgency about the crisis facing Japan and its people.
Bypassing Consensus
Secretary-General Hiroshi Moriyama, who had been present at the meeting, agreed to brief the public on the meeting's contents. However, before Moriyama spoke, the Prime Minister told reporters that he intended to remain in office. This had not been part of the four-person agreement.
It's surmised that Ishiba was concerned that an early announcement of his resignation would prompt the opposition to demand a nomination election for a new prime minister during the scheduled August 1 extraordinary Diet session.
He has also expressed determination to conduct his own review of the 80 years since the end of World War II. It is a period to which he is deeply attached.
One former prime minister, however, was furious at Prime Minister Ishiba's unilateral declaration to stay on. "I don't think we should be endorsing his continued candidacy. It makes it look like we've approved of him staying in power. Don't be ridiculous!"
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(Read the article in Japanese)
Author: The Sankei Shimbun
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