http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20070923dy01.htmThe Daily Yomiuri
Former Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda scored a comfortable victory in an election Sunday to succeed outgoing Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as president of the Liberal Democratic Party, which virtually guarantees that he will become the nation's next prime minister.
Fukuda won 330 votes, or 63 percent, while his sole rival, LDP Secretary General Taro Aso, garnered 197 of the 528 votes cast in the presidential election, held at the party's headquarters in Tokyo. LDP Diet members and representatives of the party's prefectural chapters cast votes in the presidential election. One ballot was later deemed invalid.
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"The LDP is facing a various hardships. I'll do my best to revive the party," Fukuda said after the results were announced.
He will also have to deal with such issues as extending the Maritime Self-Defense Force's refueling activities in the Indian Ocean in support of ships participating in the U.S.-led war against terrorism, a possible hike in the consumption tax rate and resolving the pension fiasco.
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His late father, Takeo Fukuda, served as prime minister from December 1976 to December 1978 as the nation's 42nd prime minister. The younger Fukuda's ascent to the helm of government represents the first time in the nation that a father and son will have served as prime minister. At 71, Yasuo Fukuda will become prime minister at the same age as his father did.
Fukuda entered the world of politics in 1976 as his father's secretary after working for an oil company for 17 years.
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The LDP presidential election was called after Abe announced his intention to resign from the post of prime minister Sept. 12, just two days after making a policy speech at the start of the extraordinary Diet session on Sept. 10.
The extraordinary Diet session was convened chiefly to discuss extending the MSDF's refueling activities in the Indian Ocean. As the mission is being conducted under the Antiterrorism Law, which will expire on Nov. 1, the government and the ruling coalition sought to either revise the law or establish a new law to allow the government to extend the MSDF mission.
Explaining his decision to step down, Abe, who already was under pressure to resign after the LDP was trounced in the July upper house election, said in his resignation speech on Sept. 12 that Ozawa, the leader of the dominant party in the upper house, had rejected his request to meet with him to discuss extending the Antiterrorism Law, and that he felt he should resign to break the political deadlock over the issue of the MSDF mission.
Fukuda's term as LDP president will last until Sept. 30, 2009, the term originally mandated for Abe in last year's presidential election.
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