There are a lot of other stories that have been in the forefront of the news in Japan this week. But there's another one that hasn't gotten the airtime it deserves – even though it might be the most important of all.
It's about Yuriko Koike, Japan's first female Defense Minister, who abruptly quit in August just weeks after her appointment to the job. At the time she was harshly criticized for the seemingly arbitrary actions that precipitated her departure. Yet now events have dramatically vindicated her move, in ways that suggest that her 55-day tenure may end up being remembered as a remarkable achievement. What did she do? Simple - she fired her deputy, the top-ranking civil servant Takemasa Moriya. The problem was that she didn't really explain it very well. All she said was that he'd been in his job for much too long (twice the regular two-year term). He was so entrenched, as a matter of fact, that people gave him the nickname "the Emperor." As soon as Koike made her announcement, the 62-year old veteran bureaucratic infighter immediately started a campaign of resistance, going so far as to petition Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. But Koike stuck to her guns. Moriya headed off into retirement, but soon his boss followed, announcing her own resignation under circumstances that have never really been clear. On the surface of things her motives seemed flimsy. Though acknowledging that she had the legal power to decide his removal, critics muttered that she had somehow violated unwritten rules of political decorum. Some of the commentaries hinted that flighty females couldn't be trusted with matters of real importance. In any case, Japan's political classes soon moved on.
Now, two months later, the whole affair has taken a startling turn. Over the past few weeks the "Emperor" has been outed as someone who looks less like a bureaucrat than a powerful freelance dealmaker, a close friend of the defense contractors who regularly sign multimillion-dollar contracts with the ministry that employed him. Moriya, grilled by Diet members in a parliamentary committee session, has admitted to going golfing with company officials more than 200 times over the last ten years at the companies' expense. 200 times! (Readers should be aware that golf outings in Japan are very expensive affairs, a much coveted luxury. Moriya's outings could have easily cost the inviter $50,000.) Records show that Moriya was sufficiently aware of the potential political sensitivity of such outings that he went to the trouble of using an alias. He also admitted continuing to accept the invitations even after such favors were expressly banned in 2000.
The scandal didn't stop there. This week Tokyo prosecutors arrested the man Moriya calls his "friend," the defense contractor executive, on embezzlement charges. It's been said that we could well be witnessing the unraveling of a scandal of historical dimensions, involving improper relationships between the defense ministry and private contractors that go back for decades. Investigators are reportedly set to look into whether there was any quid-pro-quo in the Japanese government's decision to purchase engines for Japan's CX fighter aircraft. Some say it calls to mind the mother of all postwar Japanese corruption scandals, the momentous Lockheed bribery affair of the early 1970s.
How could all the wining and dining go on for so long? For her part, Koike will say only that she saw various "bad effects" from Moriya's long reign – bad enough to justify immediate suspension. And her predecessors? It doesn't sound good. One of them pleads ignorance of Moriya's misdeeds, saying only that the revelations have made him "sad." (Sad about what? That Moriya got caught?) Another – to be specific, the man who preceded Koike in the job of minister – has even admitted to being entertained by the same company executive, hastening to add that there was nothing "inappropriate." A few hours later the same former minister entered the hospital, apparently for emergency heart surgery. (It's entirely possible that he's actually sick, of course, but it should also be noted that Japanese politicians regularly check them into hospitals when they want to avoid unwelcome
questions from the media.) He has not been heard from since.
Moriya may well have been on his way out already, given that the police investigation had been under way for months. And some critics say that Koike made her move to save herself from the political fallout she realized was on the way. Maybe. Either way, her boldness testifies to the importance of having an independent voice. The latest scandal has served to reveal once again that decades of virtual one-party rule in Japan have seriously compromised the government's ability to oversee and control the bureaucracy. Even though Koike (a fluent Arabic-speaker who has also served as environment minister and chair of the national security council) is a parliamentary deputy for the LDP, she doesn't exactly look like your usual party conformist.
What's more, even though the media have been frantically covering the Moriya scandal, few have troubled to revisit Koike's role in bringing it to light. But they may be forced to come around yet. I can only recall the vow that she made as she announced her resignation: "I shall return."
