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BY JENN LONG
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Out with the old and in with the new. Japan is now looking for its sixth prime minister in five years. Naoto Kan resigned from his post Friday morning after holding the position for only 15 months. Euronews explains.
“The aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami saw Kan’s approval rating drop below 20 percent. He was much criticized for his handling of the radiation crisis at the Fukushima nuclear plant, successive governments have also struggled to deal rooted economic problems in the face of a divided parliament.”
Kan’s announcement Friday came around the same time Japan’s nuclear agency released a statement regarding Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant.
And the report found the radioactivity at Fukishma ‘equals 168 Hiroshimas’. The Global Post compares the two disasters…
“…the government calculated that the amount of cesium released in the six months since the three reactors were hit by the earthquake and tsunami is 15,000 tera becquerels. In comparison, Little Boy, the World War II bomb dropped on the western Japanese city of Hiroshima, released 89 tera becquerels.”
The Chief Japan economist at Societe General tells Bloomberg Television that Kan was one of Japan’s worst prime ministers for two reasons. The first being his handling of the crisis in March. The second?
“But another bigger sin is actually more long term. Last year he lost the upper house election by a landslide … So now you have upper house controlled by the opposition party, the lower house controlled by the ruling party with this split there is no way Japan can make any structure changes.”
The Democratic Party of Japan now has the task of finding Kan’s replacement. And who will take his place? CNBC reporter Sri Jegarajah reports from Tokyo.
“Kan's resignation is really part of the Kabuki theater of Japanese politics in many ways … That means in turn, that has paved the way for this DPJ leadership election to take place. Now that vote will happen on Monday and what do we know about the field of candidates? It is quite wide, were talking about as many as nine prospective hopefuls here.”
The world will know on Tuesday who Japan’s next Prime Minister will be.
Transcript by Newsy.
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