Can Japan’s ‘safe’ minister Yoko Kamikawa become PM as Kishida’s star wanes over funding scandal?

Foreign Minister Kamikawa appears to have successfully distanced herself from LDP funding scandal while performing role well on the global stage, analysts say

The LDP could hope to reset its image by pushing for Kamikawa to play a key role in the party, but she may lack the necessary support to become PM, they add

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Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa at a joint press conference in Warsaw, Poland, on January 8. Photo: AFP

Published: 8:00pm, 11 Jan 2024Updated: 8:57pm, 11 Jan 2024

With Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s poll ratings hitting record lows and the Japanese public seething at senior ruling party members embroiled in financial scandals, debate has turned to the nation’s next leader – and the possibility it might be a woman: recently appointed Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa.

Kishida’s numbers were tumbling in the latter part of last year, sinking to 22 per cent in mid-December, over revelations that dozens of members of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) had failed to declare funds earned from political fundraising events and simply pocketed the money.

The fallout from the scandal has continued into the new year, with the arrest on Sunday of Yoshitaka Ikeda, an LDP backbencher, on suspicion that he took funds amounting to 48.26 million yen (US$331,800) from 2017 to 2022 and failed to report them.

Yoshitaka Ikeda (behind right) poses with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida (front left) in Tokyo in November 2021. Ikeda was arrested on suspicion that he took funds from 2017 to 2022 and failed to report them. Photo: AP

The scandal has shaken the LDP’s powerful Abe faction, previously headed by the late prime minister Shinzo Abe, which has traditionally held a great deal of influence over incoming leaders.

Local reports claim the group amassed some 500 million yen in a secret slush fund, and virtually every member has been implicated, with some political pundits suggesting it could even “collapse” under the weight of the bad publicity.

Kishida has launched a task force to tackle the scandal in an attempt to restore support for his government.

However, with Kishida weakened, potential rivals disgraced, and even politicians who have managed to avoid the taint of scandal failing to firmly state their cases for the leadership position, top diplomat Kamikawa has been tipped as a quiet challenger.

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