Japanese opposition promotes Ozawa for PM

Political efforts to find a successor to outgoing Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe heated up Thursday with the opposition planning to support Ichiro Ozawa.

Ozawa, president of the Democratic Party of Japan, will seek to become the next prime minister Tuesday in the runoff election in the upper house of parliament, which the ruling Liberal Democratic Party no longer controls.

But the opposition move is unlikely to threaten the new LDP president, who is virtually assured to succeed Abe because of the party’s comfortable majority in the lower house, Kyodo news service reported.

DP will elect its new president Sunday. The front-runners are Yasuo Fukuda, a former chief Cabinet secretary, and Taro Aso, a former foreign minister.

Kyodo said if the two houses differ on the choice of a prime ministerial candidate, a joint committee will be asked to decide. If no agreement is reached in the joint committee, the choice of the lower house will prevail, the report said.

The DPJ, however, urged the three other opposition parties to support Ozawa in both houses, to show solidarity, the report said. // Copyright 2007 by United Press International

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