Politics of Comparisons (A letter sent to friends)

Hi,

We are living in a world of comparisons. Our political analyses are so embedded with comparisons that we could understand things in a better way. But what stunned me a few days back was the attempts of Indian corporate media and the extreme left (weak-minded radicals if I use a friend's term) to draw parallels between Budhadeb and the fascist Narendra Modi. We know that every political formation will have its own agenda. Even the middle class apologetics keep their plans wide open in our polity. Initially, I just wrote this bizzare comparison off thinking that it would not work. However, things took a drastic turn as the weak-minded radicals, along with the corporate media, made this Modi-Budhadeb comparison as a weapon to attack the Left.

One can argue that thousands of Muslims were butchered in Modiland in early 2002 while a couple of dozen Bengalis were killed in the March 14 Nandigram firing. Still, I am not after head-counts. Rather, I would like to see the politics behind these incidents and the agenda behind these comparisons. The corporate media, which is anti-Left by its own definition, won in driving a point home. For them, BJP, which is led by the likes of Modi, is a party which shares their economic philosophy. Modi, a Neo-Rightist by all definitions, calls himself the Messiah of corporate Gujarat.
On the other side, the Left, though it's modified its stand on many economic issues including SEZ's, still is a stumbling block for many of the neoliberal projects. Though Budhadeb was the blue-eyed communist of the India Inc., they have always been at odds with the party. There were ample criticisms from leftist corners against the economic policies of Budhadeb well before Nandigram tragedy. Actually, Nandigram should have fuelled the leftist debates about the neo-liberal regime and corporate industrialisation. But the corporate media, which has never tolerated any criticism against the free-flow of the metropolitan capital, wanted to deflect the post-Nandigram debates. The same media houses which once showered Budhadeb with praises, took a U turn to call him a Stalinist dictator. He was compared with Narenda Modi and the party was blamed for its Stalinist nature. Whatever happened was not because of the corporate industrialisation but because of the Stalinist nature of the Marxist party. Singing the same tune, the weak-minded radicals found it an opportunity to beat the mainstream left and started out a campaign calling CPM a ‘Social Fascist’ organisation. This is something Leon Trostsky called Stalin in 1930s criticising his socio-economic policies. Did the radicals become Trostsko-Libertarian anarchists an overnight only because CPM is called a Stalinist party? Or, they are too ignorant to understand the historical significance of the Trotskian term ‘Social fascists’? Malayalies, who read the Naxalite turned Neoliberal, K Venu, might be familiar with that term. Venu started calling CPM a ‘Social Fascist’ party right from early 1990s.
My point is simple. Deflecting the entire leftist debate is an agendum of the corporate houses. Attacking the mainstream left blue and black is, unfortunately, not a way but the objective of the weak-minded radicals. In their combined effort, what's missing is the real focus on the neoliberal barbarism. Whether it is the West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh or Orissa, the common people are suffering because the neoliberal regime. SEZ's are going to be the graveyards of Indian farmers. Instead of pointing out that, we are so caught up with the left-bashing of the corporate India. Drawing parallels between Budhadeb and a cultural fascist like Narenda Modi is ultimately aimed at giving a face-lift to Modi and his fascist agenda. And that's what the corporate India wants to happen.

Stanlee

Well Known, Still a Shock

I WAS SAFE in my hometown in Kerala when Muslims were butchered in Modiland. Thanks to the Malayalam media, we received horrible descriptions of the genocidal State-sponsored crime of the deshi fascists. We knew that everything was pre-planned. We knew that the “protectors” themselves organised this genocide. We knew Modi would be re-elected in December 2002. We knew the victims of the genocide would not get justice. We knew that not even a single RSS supporter would change his or her political outlook and social view.
Yet I was shocked to see TEHELKA’s latest issue. I was shocked when I saw a VHP leaderproudly claim to have torn out the womb of a pregnant women after killing her. I lost control of my senses when he said that they did not spare even a single Muslim in Naroda Patiya, even though I already knew that that was what they had done. I cursed myself when I read about how Muslims were dumped in a well in Naroda Patiya and burned alive. I felt low again when I thought that I was also born in the same country where Modi is a ruler.
Where is one to look for a resolution?
Practically speaking, it is in the reproduction of the facts. The horror of a genocide that took place in front of us should haunt the collective conscience of secular Indians. The miseries of the poor of Gujarat should remain in our debates, in our public sphere, our media, our art, our literature, our cinema. A permanent reproduction of the facts. That should be the foundation of the anti-communal crusade of our generation. We should remind ourselves that we are the children of the killings.
When the Babri Masjid was demolished by the Hindutva fundamentalists, we failed to launch an all-out campaign against the perpetrators. Ten years later, they struck again, killing thousands of Muslims in Modiland. If we fail once again, we do not know what awaits us in 2012.

(Published in Tehelka November 17, 2007)

Manhood Defined

What makes Ernesto Che Guevara one of the most charismatic revolutionaries of the twentieth century? Unlike other leading Marxist leaders of last century such as Lenin and Mao, Che was neither a theoretician nor a supreme leader of any revolution. An Argentine-born doctor, Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, was handpicked by Fidel Castro when the latter was preparing for the Moncado barrack attack. Ever since they met each other in Mexico, Che became a member of Fidel’s July 26^th movement and later the second commandant of the guerilla army that waged a successful war against American backed General Fulgencio Batista in Havana.

As many political scientists have pointed out, Che Guevara was a professional revolutionary. He subscribed to Fidel’s intellection of spreading revolution across Americas with his heart. “The duty of the revolutionary is to make the revolution,” so said Che describing his own eventful life of long battles. After winning the Sierra Maestra battle, we would find him fighting in the Congo. He was entrusted by Fidel to “liquidate the counter revolutionaries in order to save the

revolution”. He even quit Castro’s ruling team to join hands with the Bolivian guerillas, who were fighting the military dictatorship of Rene Barrientos. As noted British Marxist Tariq Ali observes, that single decision changed Che’s image and appeal altogether. As many of the other revolutionaries relinquished their revolutionary credentials after their respective triumphs, Che gave up power to build up a guerilla movement in Bolivian forests against Barrientos. Unlike in Sierra Maestra where he played second fiddle to Fidel, he was the supreme leader of Bolivian guerillas. But history hardly repeats. The heavy hands of Bolivian military generals crushed the rebellion and shot dead its 39-year-old leader on 8^th October 1967.

However, the death of Che Guevara was only the beginning of the story. Fidel Castro declared the year of 1967 as “the year of great revolutionaries”. Drawing inspiration from Che the students and youth across the Europe intensified the anti-war and anti-imperial movements. Che was the icon of the French students who led the May 1968 movement that caused the eventual collapse of the De Gaulle regime. Che became of charismatic larger than life figure, more popular than his own leader Fidel, not only in Cuba, but across the world. His challenge to American capitalism to “create two, three...many Vietnams” echoed in different parts of the world. He was largely considered as a symbol of romantic rebellion during the heydays of the Cold War.

However, the antithesis to this revolutionary appeal is ‘Brand Che’. Fidel Castro might have survived the fall of Soviet Union in the early 1990s. But the changing dynamics in the post-Cold war world order, transformed Che’s image. He once dared capitalism to create more Vietnams. But capitalism, understanding his mass appeal, incorporated him in its market economy as a brand name. Now Che is more a market tool than a revolutionary icon. A glamorous photograph of Che taken by Cuban photographer Alberto Korda Diaz on March 5, 1960, has become a favorite symbol for the neoliberal marketists as well as the Anti American leftists. The bearded face with long hair and eyes fixed at infinity is everywhere in today’s world. Its there on T-shirts, cigarettes, ice cream, socks, alcohols and even on the bodies of football stars. Recently a designer put Che on a bikini. American retailer giant Target has recently reported that its Che Guevara CD cases had topped last Christmas season in the country. “Che is a symbol of romantic idealism. His immortal image has a value which can be used by the market forces as well as for a larger social cause. The contemporary capitalism which is dominated by the media culture has taken Che Guevara’s image out of the context and made it as a brand. Now we witness the icon floating free in the market. But at the same time there are serious attempts to bring the icon back into its revolutionary origin, especially in Latin America,” A.K. Ramakrishnan, a professor of International Relations at Mahatma Gandhi University told B&E.

The “21^st century socialists” such as Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and Evo Morales of Bolivia seem to have undertaken this mission of liberating the revolutionary from the clutches of market capitalism. Chavez has already said that he wanted to create the guevarista “new man” across the continent. Time would show who would win in this strange battle waged in the name of a charismatic revolutionary.

(Published on Business & Economy, November 1, 2007)

Chikungunya In northern Italy

The recent outbreak of chikungunya, a tropical disease spread by mosquitoes, in the Italian province of Ravenna, has sparked an unusual debate among the scientists. Last month the Italian Health Ministry had officially confirmed the outbreak of chikungunya in the northern parts of the country. Acording to officials, more than 200 cases have so far been detected in Italy. One death was also reported. Sending alrm rings across the continent, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) has warned that the debilitating tropical virus might sweep through the other European countries. Many experts blamed the changes in the temperature for the latest outbreak of the disease in Europe. According to Professor Antoine Flahault, the coordinator of French research on chikungunya, “Though the Tiger mosquitoes were present in Italy for several years, the increased temperatures and humidity make the climate more tropical and favour the proliferation of mosquitoes." The World Health Organisation officials have also underscored the same point. "We cannot say that the disease was caused by climate change, but the conditions in Italy are now suitable for the Tiger mosquito," said Dr Bettina Menne of the WHO about the outbreak. However, Professor Paul Reiter, the director of the Insects and Infectious Diseases Unit of the Paris-based Institut Pasteur, has come up with a different argument.

Prof. Reiter, who has also worked for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for over 20 years, has claimed in a recently published article that the WHO official’s statement is aimed at diverting attention from the real cause: “the increasing globalization of disease as a result of modern transportation.” He recalls an incident of finding tires that contained rainwater infested with Aedes albopictus (today’s Asian Tiger mosquito) in the US city of Houston two decades ago. He also discovered that the company which shipped scavenged tires to many Central American countries imported them from Japan. “The tiger arrived in Italy in the 1990s in tires from Atlanta, Georgia and is ubiquitous from the Alps to Naples,” says Prof. Reiter. Citing the endemics that gripped the tropical as well as the non tropical regions, he says, “the globalization of mosquitoes and mosquito-borne diseases is nothing new and we can expect further surprises in the future.” Reiter’s arguments have raised many eyebrows as he lashes out at the alarmists of the global warming saying they are actually distorting scientific facts in order to fit their arguments.

(Published on Business&Economy on November 1, 2007)

Waiting For The Sport In Paris

"There could be sport - and not just in the rugby stadiums," said Bernard Thibault, the leader of France’s powerful communist-leaning CGT union, sending an alarm note to President Nicolas Sarkozy, who announced pension reforms last week. This sentence gives indication about the tough time lies ahead of the reform-minded president. Thibault’s warning could not be played down in a country like France where the unionized workforce could even bring down the government in the past in order to save the social security system. The showdown between the trade unions and the conservative President, Sarkozy hit a new high as the latter announced that he would bring an end to the so-called “special regimes” which offer retirement privileges for state workers. The “special regimes” that date back to the Second World War ensure special retirement privileges for certain state workers including bus and train drivers, miners, merchant sailors. According to the president, it’s the highest liability of the French state these days to sustain the costly social security policies. Promising to “modernize” France’s economic sector and to meet the European Union deadline of 2012 to balance the budget, Sarkozy sends out a tough message to the highly organized French workforce.

Given the history of French unionism, Sarkozy is out to play a risky game. Touching the holy cow of French revolution, the welfare state, has never been an easy task for any leader in France. Whenever the previous governments tried to axe the Special Regimes, they had been badly beaten by the workers. In 1995, workers paralysed the whole country and brought down the first government of Jacques Chirac when he tried to reform the pension scheme. The Socialists who suffered a setback in the last presidential elections have already upped the ante accusing Sarkozy of suffering from "small man syndrome". Referring to president’s reform plan, Benoît Hamon, a Socialist spokesman, said, "In psychoanalysis, this is what you call the syndrome of the small man who considers that everything he does is bigger than anything that has ever happened.

With Nicolas Sarkozy, all he does, all he touches, he considers it to be the greatest. In reality, we have never witnessed such a step backwards since the liberation - on the social issue, as well as on immigration."

So, the writing on the wall is clear. If Sarkozy is serious in bringing in reforms, he would have to strike a deal with the workers. If not, he should be prepared to face the ire of the most powerful workforce in the continent.

(Published on Business and Economy on 6 September 2007)

The Bleeding Hills

“We will smoke them out their hiding holes,” said US President George W. Bush before launching his war on Taliban-controlled Afghanistan in 2001. Six years have gone by since the war was declared. Perhaps, Bush himself might have forgotten these words as the Western army is still busy fighting the Taliban extremists in the hilly areas of this South Asian country. Recent reports say that the Taliban is on the rise in the South. Though, the NATO led forces have been deployed across southern Afghanistan, the kidnapping of 23 Korean Christians on the country’s main highway last month illustrates the burgeoning influence of Taliban.

After six years of relentless fighting, now it’s almost clear that the victory against Taliban militants in Afghanistan is not as easy as expected. The puppet regime in Kabul is still struggling, despite the military support of the western troops, to expand its authority beyond the boundaries of Kabul city. President Hamid Karzai is more or less acting as Kabul mayor. Outside the capital, large swathes of the country remain under the control of tribal warlords. Across the south, the regrouping Taliban fighters gain influence. On the eastern side, Taliban has hideouts in the tribal areas of Afghanistan-Pakistan border areas. Though the Musharraf regime claimed to have taken strong action against Taliban in Northern Pakistan, the attempt has proven failure as the militants still unleash bloody attacks in the border areas. The militants also control the opium trade out of which they can generate funds for their operations.

Britain has at least in principle accepted this reality. Brigadier John Lorimer, the Commander of UK forces in Helmland province of Afghanistan recently told The Observer that it would take minimum 38 years for the British troops to withdraw from the war-torn country. The British army’s largest mission in its military history is the 38-year long Northern Ireland operation. If Brig Lorimer foresees a larger military operation in Afghanistan than the Ireland adventure, it’s only because of the worsening conditions of Afghanistan.

However, the US, the largest ally in the Afghan mission, appears to be in no mood to accept the grim reality in Afghanistan. Earlier this month US Assistant Secretary of state for South and Central Asia Richard Boucher seemed so confident while he talked to reporters about Afghanistan. “Afghanistan is in a much better position now than it ever was before as a nation,” said Boucher. However, Boucher’s optimism proved hollow as the latest report of the Human Rights Watch depicted the grim picture of Afghanistan. According to the New York based group, the western army has dropped more than 400 bombs on Afghanistan in the past three months. Some other military sources reveal that more than 6,000 people have been killed in the fight between the army and the militants in the past one and a half years.

Without taking any concrete steps either to build a functioning democracy or to cope with the growing insurgency, the Americans, as well as the Afghan forces, are now trying to turn the heat on Iran. The Afghan military leaders recently accused the Islamic government of Iran of trafficking weapons and other explosives to Afghanistan in order to help the Taliban fight the western forces. Colonel Rahmatullah Safi, head of the border police of for western Afghanistan recently said that the “Iranian made armour-piercing roadside bombs” were found in the frontier town of Islam Qala, near Herat on the Afghan-Iran border area. The US military leaders have also expressed concerns over the alleged “Iranian influence” in Afghanistan. In the words of Colonel Thomas Kelly, an American under the command of the NATO, the improvised explosive devices (IEDs), which were found in Afghanistan, “were not manufactured in any other place to our knowledge than Iran.”

The US is hitting the Islamic Republic with fresh allegations without producing any evidences. Earlier this year, the newly appointed Secretary of Defence Robert Gates had accused Iran of supplying the Iraqi militants with the IEDs. As they repeat the same allegations in Afghanistan also, one might get confused of the sincerity of this blame game. Furthermore, many analysts are of the view that the ideological differences between the Iranian Shiite regime and the Sunni Taliban prevent both sides from any engagement. It’s better to be recalled that the Islamic Republic had cooperated with the Americans when the latter launched the Afghan invasion in October 2001. Iran has always been a hardcore critic of the Sunni Taliban politics particularly since the massacre of Shiites in Herat under the Taliban rule.

However the Bush administration, which failed terribly both in Afghanistan and in Iraq, is busy spending its energy and time in the international blame game against Iran without trying to rectify its own mistakes. It’s pretty contradictory to know that the US which is waging a global war against Islamic militancy is not even able to rein in the situations in Afghanistan where it has started the war six years ago.

Stanly Mambilly

Resilence Of Political Islam

With the triumph of Hamas in last month's election in Palestine, politics in Islamic countries has taken a historic turn. In an international scenario in which Islamic polity, or Islamism, poses cultural challenges to the West, the victory of Hamas seems to haveredrawn the political landscape of the region, challenging the US's "democratisation" process. Many commentators are of the opinion that the Hamas triumph harks back to the so-called Iranian revolution of 1979.The Islamists had overthrown the monarchy of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1979. The Iranian society that was reasonably secular under Shah did not have an option but to live under repressive mullahs.A declared objective of Iranian foreign policy was to export 'revolution' to other Islamic countries. But the worried West Asian monarchs along with the US put an effective check on the mullahs. The eight-year long Iran-Iraq war was a planned one. The chosen scapegoat, the self-declared saviour of the Arab cause, Saddam Hussein, fought against Iran on behalf of the Americans and the Islamic monarchs.In the early 1990s, Islamism had become less of a threat. Iran had come out of its revolutionary nostalgia, and become pragmatic. But post 9/11, Islamism has burst onto the world scene with vengeance.Islamism has had two versions: One, the Al-Qaeda-type terrorism and the other, mass movements led by the Muslim Brotherhood. Both these factions are militant, rigid in religious matters and offer resistance to a common enemy: Democratic plulalism.
The recent election result in West Asia shows the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood to new heights. Now an isolated Iran is not able to spread Islamism in other countries. Yet, Islamist governments are coming to power in its neighbourhood, that too through the democratic process. This is the biggest challenge that the US and other liberal democracies are facing in West Asia.In a municipal election held in Saudi Arabia last April Wahhabi Islamists emerged victorious. The Muslim Brotherhood, brutally suppressed since Nasser's time, performed remarkably well in the Egyptian parliamentary election held last December. Following the US's biggest blunder in West Asia, Iraq became the first country in the world that elected Islamists to power. The Shia-led Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) coalition swept the 2005December election. The SCIRI has close links with Iran and is inimical to the US and all liberal democracies. Therefore, Hamas' victory is just the continuation of the Islamists'triumph in West Asia. Hamas is universally recognised as a terrorist organisation.
And this terrorist organisation has been elected to power ironically through democratic means. This is the paradox that the US confronts. If it goes ahead with its so-called democratization process, it will see Islamist Governments coming to power in theentire region.Anti-Americanism lies at the core of the illiberal and fundamentalist philosophy Islamism in modern times. In addition Islamists are sworn enemies of Israel. If the US goes after its next target which is Iran, Islamism will only grow in political strength.With this theinternational community confronts a new scenario. It has to make a distinction between terrorism and Islamist movements. How else can it deal with the new Islamist Governments that have come to power.
(Published on The Pioneer on February 19, 2006)

Honey, I Shrunk The Party

Call it the new age dialectics invented by those in charge of concocted revolution. The political dilemma that the politburo of the CPI(M) faces now is purely historical, but with a difference; it is paradoxically historical. It now embattles the enigmatic irony of a political Right-turn which has been vehemently checked by an army of comrades who now face the threat of isolation and retaliatory action just because they seemed a stumbling block to the new-age CPI(M).
It all started with the March 12 Central Committee decision that barred the Politburo members from contesting Assembly election. A shot in the arm for the capitalist comrades in Kerala who were waiting for a chance to herald the political death of VS Achuthanandan, the leader of the die-hard ideologues in the State.
The Central Committee decision paved the way for the March 16 Kerala State Committee announcement that denied him a seat in the coming Assembly election. The move invited protests from supporters of the VS faction who considered Mr Achuthanandan the only means to check the surging onslaught of the so-called agenda of globalisation in the State.
However, the capitalist comrades in the Kerala CPI(M), who have all been up in arms against this apostle of ideal Marxism, have made up their mind, scripting what they called the requiem on the political existence of the old Red admiral.
This very episode makes one recall the enigma of the metamorphosis of the Marxist party into a post-modern social democratic party that discards the very credentials of its own ideology, a transformation into a market-driven Marxist party. Is this accidental? No. Historical by all means, but as we stated above, with a difference.
The ideological churn that has been haunting the Indian Left in the post-Soviet era has produced its offspring now, though quite accidentally. Blind to the rational and radical developments that whirlpooled the Indian political arena, the Politburo now is a divided
lot. The party in Kerala always relied on Mr Achuthanandan, a vocal critic of the neo-liberal economic environment, to gather momentum in the battle against capitalism. It upheld his personality as an ambassador of "anti-capitalist agenda". But the shift in the political stance has forced it to invent a new political vocabulary using which it can never script the sort of revolution it is used to.
That Mr Achuthanandan is the last name that the capitalist comrades in the Kerala CPI(M) can think of when it comes to facing the 2006 Assembly election means the political ideology that he represented has become obsolete to them. A drastic change, indeed. For the new-age Marxist messiahs in Kerala, Mr Achuthanandan is a stale Marxist metaphor. So, doing away with that metaphor comes only as the last step in the historic transformation of a Marxist party to the so-called social democratic party.
The violent outbreak of protests against the leadership - that too in Kerala - underscores the very transition of Marxist party. The party has never faced such a crisis; that of its own activists leading protest march to the AKG Bhavan - the secretarial palace of Kerala party - even when former Red hands like Ms KR Gouri and Mr MV Raghavan were sacked from the party. This has also shed light on the political and organisational challenges that the party faces in the eve of another crucial Assemble election. The Indian Left may still fight and win revolutions on paper, but how long they can keep silent on the questions rising against their own ideological dilemma?

(Article Published on The Pioneer, March 12, 2006)

Vietnam Comes Back To Haunt...

"The price of America's withdrawal (from Vietnam) was paid by millions of innocent citizens, whose agonies would add to our vocabulary new terms like boat people, re-education camps and killing fields," so said US President George W. Bush in an unexpected attempt to draw parallels between the Iraq war and America’s cold war nightmare in Vietnam. In Bush’s view, an immediate withdrawal of the U.S. troops from the war-torn

Iraq would lead to serious consequences in that country. He hinted that Iraqis would have to undergo the similar “sufferings” of the Vietnamese people under the Communist regime. Moreover, Bush argued that if the US gets out of Iraq when the threat of militancy looms large over the West Asian country that would affect the credibility and morale of the US in its global “war on terrorism.”

So far the critics of the Bush administration have called the Iraq fiasco, the Vietnam of President Bush. And the supporters of the war, particularly the neo-cons in the administration resisted any move to draw parallels between the most contentious two wars in the history of the US. As things stand so, why this change of tone? Now, one might wonder as Bush himself accepts this analogy. Though Bush helped his enemies revive the old debate over the Iraq-Vietnam wars, his intentions look different from that of his detractors. The president is trying to shift the entire focus from Iraq invasion to the presumed consequences of an immediate withdrawal. Many US watchers are of the view that Bush’s risky game with historical examples is aimed at wining the support of the conservatives, who, still, believe that the Vietnam withdrawal was the manifest of vulnerability of the American political class.

If the critics used the Vietnam comparison to expose the flaws of Bush’s Iraq policy, the president invoked the so-called post-withdrawal miseries of the Vietnamese to defend his “stay the course” policy. “The Vietnam fiasco had serious consequences in US. The US lost its credibility among its own allies. President Bush doesn’t want to repeat the same. He believes the war in Iraq is winnable and he wants to get the job done. In another words, he was telling his critics: don’t tell me to repeat Vietnam in Iraq by withdrawing troops prematurely,” Prof. Chinthamani Mahapatra of Jawaharlal Nehru University told B&E. Bush has made plain that the White House would not show its green signal to any troop cut so long as he remains in power. “Unlike Vietnam, Iraq is more than ideological. Vietnam doesn’t have oil where as Iraq plays a central role in America’s grand energy plans. Bush doesn’t want to lose that,” Prof Mahapatra added.

Bush’s remarks have come just one month ahead of the scheduled tabling of the Iraq progress report by Gen. David Petraeus, which is unlikely to sound different from the official stand. Bush will use both the report and Vietnam tp once again befool the public and inform Pentagon that democracy would not be allowed to interfere with military demands.

(Published on Business and Economy, 20 September 2007)

Stanly Mambilly

Political Turmoil In Japan

"In the present situation, it is difficult to push ahead with effective policies that win the support of the public…We need a change in this situation. I find myself unable to keep my [political] promises," said former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on September 12 declaring his decision to step down. Though the decision was inevitable, the timing was surprising. Abe, the grandson of a former prime minister and the son of a former foreign minister, came to power one year back after the Liberal Democratic Party won a landslide victory in the Lower House of the Diet (Parliament). As a prime minister, he started impressively with bold moves to revive the moribund economy and sincere efforts to mend ties with China and South Korea.

However, the 52-year-old prime minister has proven to be a failure in retaining the faith and support of the people who have backed the LDP for more than half a century. The resignation of four ministers over corruption allegations and the suicide of another tainted minister in a short span of time made the Abe government extremely unpopular. Furthermore, his inability to rescue agricultural sector which was badly hit by the structural reforms of the Koizumi government drove away the rural population from Abe. This disaffection of voters was evident when the ruling LDP and its allies lost the Upper House majority to the principal opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ). Though the election defeat eroded Abe’s morale to continue in power, the August 27 cabinet reshuffle sent out a different message. The prime minister was expected to continue in office. But, Abe’s unexpected announcement of resignation took everybody by surprise. Many reasons were cited by the Japan watchers for Abe’s abrupt decision including his “ill health” and corruption scandals against him. “The prime minister’s resignation signals that the ‘Old Order’ is emerging powerful in the ruling LDP. The senior leaders, who were very critical of Abe’s neo-conservative policies wanted him to step down soon after the July election debacle. Abe’s subsequent decision to include corrupt leaders into the cabinet made his position more vulnerable within the party. Finally, he had to bow down to the inevitable,” Prof HS Prabhakar of Jawaharlal Nehru University told B&E. The resignation has come a few weeks ahead of the expiring of the “anti-terror law” which currently allows the the Japanese troops to continue to provide logistical support to the US military in Afghanistan. Abe wanted to extend the law, due to expire on November 1. However the ‘Old Order’ in the LDP and the opposition parties were against extending the law.

Anyway, Abe’s resignation has exposed the internal problems within the ruling party. Two leaders, the veteran Yasuo Fukuda and the LDP’s number two Taro Aso have already declared that they wanted to stand in the party election to be held on August 23. It’s widely perceived as a struggle between the Old Order and the New Order in the LDP. “The fundamental question at this point of time is that whether Japan, the most reliable ally of the US in the region, would remain so even after the elections,” said Dr. Prabhakar.

(Published on Business & Economy on September 27, 2007

Stanly Mambilly

leftovers

Some Faces Are Simply Unforgettable