Thirty years have passed since Japan began its political system reform efforts.
"Japanese politics is standing at a major crossroads. The public's distrust in politics has peaked following the Recruit scandal, and we face a serious situation never before seen in the history of Japanese parliamentary politics," says a political reform outline released by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in May 1989, the first year of the current Heisei era.
Public anger at the intertwining of politics and money boiled over following the Recruit influence-peddling scandal that had surfaced the previous year. The fury prompted the LDP to seek to replace the multi-seat constituency system in the House of Representatives with one combining single-seat districts with proportional representation blocs.
The reform was designed to shake up the status quo, in which the LDP's intraparty factions controlled political funding and candidate selection, and competed with one another to fill their coffers and set policy pledges during elections. However, the new single-seat electoral structure was also assumed to make power shifts more plausible, raising expectations for added tension in the political system.
The LDP's 1989 political reform outline states that the reform of the election system "would bring pain" to the party. What is notable is that the LDP, which had been in government for decades, pointed to the need for a transfer of power.
The party feared that Japan could not survive under the so-called 1955 system, under which the LDP was constantly in power, as the world was undergoing drastic changes such as the collapse of the Berlin Wall in November that year. At the time, there were calls within the business community, which had supported the LDP, for the establishment of another political party that could take over the reins of government.
The LDP was subsequently split over the introduction of the single-seat electoral system, and a package of bills on political reform was only passed into law in 1994 after a fierce power struggle. Japan finally achieved a transfer of power when the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) won the 2009 general election. However, the DPJ-led government collapsed in late 2012, ushering in a new era of LDP dominance under the second premiership of party leader Shinzo Abe.
Japan's parliamentary politics faces crisis again.
Critics have pointed out problems involving the single-seat electoral system. They say the quality of individual politicians has deteriorated because too much emphasis has been placed on party-oriented politics, and there is no longer any active debate within the LDP.
However, the political reform's original goal of establishing a system facilitating a transfer of power between political parties was not wrong.
The biggest cause of Abe's predominance is opposition parties' failure to garner voter support. The DPJ-led administration was torn by internal strife and badly lacked the capacity to govern. People's disappointment in that government lingers still.
The number of political parties had been expected to decrease following the introduction of the current lower house electoral system combining single-seat constituencies and proportional representation blocs. However, opposition parties have repeatedly split, and have failed to project a vision for the government they wish to form. The political reform has shown that simply changing the election system alone is not enough to create an environment in which capable political parties can be formed.
Prime Minister Abe is also responsible for the current situation. More than six years have passed since he returned to power. The prime minister has kept criticizing opposition parties by playing up economic indices that suggest better performance than under the DPJ-led government. He recently described the previous administration as being "like a nightmare."
One cannot help but wonder why the LDP has lost the tolerance that led to it calling for a transfer of power 30 years ago. Prime Minister Abe appears unable even to accept the fact that opinions different from his exist.
Despite being representatives of the people, opposition parties spend all their time confronting the government, and never strive to form consensus in the legislature.
The prime minister has dissolved the lower house for a snap general election when opposition parties were unprepared. And when the LDP wins, the premier acts as if to say all his government's policies have won the confidence of voters. This practice is not fair. It is more desirable for the prime minister to call an election after both the ruling and opposition parties have worked out campaign pledges and are fully prepared.
In the political reform, one of the key points of contention was how to establish a system in which the Cabinet plays a leading role in drawing up and implementing policy. In other words, one of the goals of the political reform was to transform the hitherto bureaucrat-led policy-making process into one led by politicians.
However, the Cabinet Bureau of Personnel Affairs, which was established under the second Abe administration, controls personnel management at all ministries and agencies. As a result, bureaucrats cannot frankly express their opinions to the prime minister and tend to surmise his intentions in implementing policy measures.
Allowing the Cabinet to work out policy measures was designed to increase transparency of the policy-making processes. Nevertheless, the Finance Ministry doctored documents on a heavily discounted sale of state-owned land to the Moritomo Gakuen school operator, which had links to Prime Minister Abe's wife Akie. There has since been a tendency within the government to clad the policy-making machinery in secrecy.
It is the Diet's role to monitor what the executive branch of the government is doing. However, the legislature has failed to fulfill this role, and acts instead like a subcontractor of the administrative branch. This is apparently because the prime minister has forgotten the spirit of the 1989-1994 political reform and used changes to the system to his advantage.
Critics have warned that democratic politics are in crisis in various countries, including Britain, which Japan has regarded as a model. The Heisei era comes to an end at the end of this month. In political reform in the next Reiwa era, it is necessary to discuss what the Diet is and what political parties truly are.

Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) is preparing to bring in foreign workers with special technical skills to join decommissioning work on the disaster-stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
At present, an average of 4,000 employees of TEPCO and cooperating firms work at the facility every day. Laws and regulations stipulate that workers' radiation exposure must be limited to 50 millisieverts in a single year, and 100 millisieverts over five years. No one is allowed to stay at the plant once they hit one of these caps, so waves of new employees must be brought in to maintain worker numbers.
Decommissioning the Daiichi plant, which suffered a triple core meltdown in the wake of the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami, is expected to take 30 to 40 years. Whether the companies involved can sustain sufficient staffing levels will be one factor that determines the success or failure of the project.
When it comes to tapping foreign labor to make up the required numbers, the Justice Ministry -- which has jurisdiction over Japan's immigration system -- has already declined to approve sending foreign technical intern trainees to work at the plant. One of the core tenets of the foreign technical trainee program is that the job placements must provide the trainees with skills they can use in their home countries, and working to decommission a devastated nuclear plant did not fit the bill.
TEPCO is now turning its eyes to foreign workers with Category 1 work visas, one of the new residency statuses launched on April 1 and aimed at those with certain skills and experience. Technical trainees with three years' experience in Japan can obtain this visa without a skills exam.
However, there is a real risk of radiation exposure at the Daiichi plant, and the terminology used on-site is highly technical, making for a difficult environment. TEPCO and its partners must not treat the new foreign worker system as an employee pool they can simply dip into.
The workers' Japanese level is particularly a cause for worry. To obtain a Category 1 visa, applicants must speak Japanese at only a "daily conversational" level. However, anyone working at the Daiichi site must understand a slew of technical terms related to radiation and other facets of the decommissioning process, meaning a very high level of Japanese is absolutely indispensable. If foreign employees begin working there without having learned the necessary terminology, we believe there is a real risk they could be ordered to do jobs that exposed them to radiation.
TEPCO has said it is up to its project partners whether they employ Category 1 foreign workers. In fact, the majority of people at Fukushima Daiichi are employed by one of the firms that make up the layers upon layers of subcontractors working on the decommissioning. Nevertheless, as the company heading the project, TECPO has a responsibility to oversee the conditions of every worker, right down to the bottom of the pyramid.
Furthermore, if a foreign worker has been exposed to radiation overseas, that dose must be added to their sievert count at the plant. However, it is up to the worker to report any previous radiation exposure, which can make it difficult to properly track and manage their doses.
If a worker develops a radiation-related illness after returning to their home country, will they be able to smoothly apply for workers' accident compensation? This is also a serious worry.
If Japan is to accept foreign workers to help decommission the Fukushima Daiichi plant, it is absolutely essential to create the appropriate environment, including measures to boost their Japanese skills and strengthen radiation exposure management.

A candidate opposing the controversial relocation of a U.S. military base within Okinawa Prefecture was elected to the House of Representatives in a by-election in the southernmost prefecture on April 21. The outcome has clarified that the national government's strategy of forcibly proceeding with reclamation work to convince local residents that the project is a done deal, thereby creating a sense of helplessness among local residents, is unacceptable.
The by-election in the Okinawa No. 3 constituency was called to fill the seat vacated by Denny Tamaki, who stepped down to run in the Okinawa gubernatorial election last autumn. The electoral district is situated in the northern part of Okinawa's main island that includes Nago, to which the government is aiming to relocate the U.S. base.
Tomohiro Yara, an opponent of the base relocation backed by most liberal opposition parties, defeated Aiko Shimajiri, who ran on the ticket of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), by a landslide in the by-election held simultaneously with the second round of nationwide local elections. Gov. Tamaki, who beat his then-LDP opponents in the 2014 and 2017 lower house elections, is also an opponent of the base relocation within the prefecture. Yara's victory thus means the anti-base relocation forces successfully kept their seat.
Over the past six or so months, Okinawa residents rejected the relocation of the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma base in the city of Ginowan to the Henoko district of Nago on three occasions: the September 2018 gubernatorial election, a February 2019 prefectural referendum and the latest by-election.
In other words, the administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe suffered three consecutive defeats after moving ahead with the relocation project in defiance of local public opinion.
Just like in the gubernatorial election, a candidate supported by the "All Okinawa" political forces, comprising most key opposition parties, clashed head-on with a candidate the LDP fielded with the backing of its coalition partner Komeito and the conservative opposition Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party) in the by-election.
During campaigning for the gubernatorial race, the conservative alliance's strategy of not mentioning the base relocation issue was criticized as an attempt to hide the key point of contention. As part of the strategy, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga emphasized that various issues, ranging from the economy to social welfare, were points of contention.
In the latest election, Shimajiri made it a point to mention her support for the relocation project during her campaign and lost the race. It is no longer permissible to obscure the significance of the election outcome or to conclude that the results are due to circumstances unique to Okinawa.
Despite her high profile, Shimajiri, who had served two six-year terms as a House of Councillors' member and had been a minister for Okinawa and Northern Territories affairs, suffered a crushing defeat. If the Abe government refuses to take this outcome seriously, it would mean elections, which are part of the democratic process, are meaningless.
There are those within the LDP who do not regard the party's defeat in the Okinawa by-election as a big deal, saying it had been predicted. This is because the LDP has continued to win Diet elections on a nationwide scale -- with the exception of Okinawa Prefecture, where it has suffered defeat after defeat -- since the second Abe administration was launched in December 2012.
However, hasn't this given rise to a twisted view within the LDP that the governing bloc can disrespect Okinawa's public opinion as long as government administration sees no repercussions?
The legitimacy of the government derives from the people and the legitimacy of the government's exercise of its power is checked via elections. The Abe administration should immediately discontinue the reclamation work off Henoko and squarely face public opinion in Okinawa.

Japan and the United States have launched ministerial trade talks and to Tokyo's relief, Washington stopped short of making tough demands over key issues such as agricultural products and automobiles, according to those familiar with the discussions. Still, concerns remain as to whether Japan could be forced to bow to pressure from President Donald Trump, who is pursuing an "America First" policy.
Japan and the United States have agreed to hold talks on Japan's opening of its agricultural market to the world based on levels that Japan accepted in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) free trade pact. The United States appears desperate to move ahead with bilateral trade talks because the country has been placed in a disadvantageous position over exports to Japan after the TPP accord went into force without participation by Washington.
After the bilateral negotiations, economic revitalization minister Toshimitsu Motegi recalled that the two countries "got off to a good start." The ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is attempting to emphasize the trade talks as an achievement made by the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as the summer 2019 House of Councillors election is drawing near.
However, the bilateral trade talks will enter their key phase from now on. President Trump, who is seeking re-election in the next presidential election in 2020, is scrambling to garner votes from farmers and workers in the automobile industry. There are fears that Trump will intensify his pressure on Japan in a bid to win concessions from Tokyo.
Calls persist within the United States urging Japan to liberalize its agricultural market more than called for under the TPP agreement. If Tokyo were to give in to such demands, it would place Washington, which has broken away from the TPP pact, at a more advantageous position than parties to the accord. This would be the equivalent of putting the cart before the horse.
Concerns remain as to whether the United States will threaten to place quantitative restrictions on car imports from Japan.
The Trump government pressured Mexico and Canada into accepting measures to effectively place quantitative restrictions by reviewing the trilateral North American Free Trade Agreement. Washington views such measures as a key bargaining chip in talks aimed at reducing its trade deficit.
What is also worrisome is that the United States is insisting that a provision should be added to trade agreements to ban parties from devaluating their own currencies to be advantageous to their exports.
Tokyo and Washington have already agreed not to intentionally devaluate their own currencies through such measures as market intervention. However, a decline in the value of a currency as a result of a credit easing policy is internationally accepted. If such a currency provision is incorporated in trade agreements that are legally binding, Japan's monetary policy could be bound by the desires of the United States.
The fate of the bilateral trade talks depends largely on what President Trump will say during bilateral summit discussions next week.
Prime Minister Abe has stated that Japan will play a leading role in promoting free trade. If so, he should encourage Trump to exercise prudence in preventing Japan-U.S. talks from further harming the world's free trade system.

Mobile phone giant NTT Docomo Inc.'s decision to cut its monthly fees from June is hoped to spark more competition among carriers that will lead to cheaper and less complicated payment plans.
Docomo aims to abolish the current pricing system under which it steeply discounts the prices of handsets on condition that subscribers sign long-term contracts with the firm, and offer a choice between much simpler contract options: 5,980 yen per month for unlimited data, and 1,980 yen for those with lower data needs. Under the new system, Docomo's monthly charges will be slashed by up to 40 percent.
It is only natural for the carrier to slash its mobile phone fees since communications charges in Japan are higher than in other countries. This coming autumn, e-commerce and internet giant Rakuten Inc. will enter the mobile phone market that is effectively now controlled by three major companies including NTT Docomo, which will spur further competition.
The pricing system under which carriers discount the prices of handsets on condition that subscribers sign long-term contracts has played a certain role in spreading mobile phone use in Japan. However, consumers who continue to use the same handsets hardly benefit from such a pricing system, and there is no denying that the scheme has hindered the spread of low-priced handsets.
At one point there appeared to be excessive competition in the mobile phone market as shops were giving subscribers free handsets, but the financial resources needed to make some devices free had been covered by customers on long-term contracts.
Carriers offered such discounts on condition that subscribers sign two- to four-year contracts. Moreover, these firms often recommended that customers sign numerous optional contracts, and consumers complained that the pricing system lacked transparency. Since the mobile phone market has matured, NTT Docomo's review of its pricing system reflects the changing of the times.
However, NTT Docomo's move is feared to cause the retail prices of high-end smartphones to rise. If that is the case, it could offset the effects of communication fee cuts.
There are consumers who buy new smartphones every two to three years because their batteries become drained. The industry should step up efforts to reduce the prices of handsets.
A new market should be established where reasonably priced phones with only selected functions and comparatively cheap second-hand smartphones whose quality are guaranteed can be bought.
Docomo's latest decision was sparked by requests from politicians. In August 2018, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said mobile phone communications fees "could be cut by 40 percent." Moreover, the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry is seeking revisions to the Telecommunications Business Act as early as this coming autumn to make it obligatory to completely separate communications fees from the prices of handsets.
It is inappropriate for politicians to intervene in private businesses' pricing. However, NTT Docomo deserves criticism for failing to take any action until it was pressured by politicians to slash its fees.
Mobile phones using public radio waves are an important part of social infrastructure and are indispensable as a means to protect people's lives in the event of natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods. Therefore, mobile phone carriers have a duty to offer prices and services that meet the demands of consumers.

Diet reform discussions have not progressed during the current regular session in spite of criticism that the legislature's functions are deteriorating. Despite this, are ruling and opposition parties just going to continue as-is and wrap up the session before this summer's House of Councillors election? One cannot help but be appalled at the lack of urgency among legislators concerning the issue.
In June last year, a multipartisan group of lawmakers including Shinjiro Koizumi of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) launched an initiative dubbed "the council for achieving lower house reform before the Heisei era ends."
Under deliberation in the House of Representatives are subjects such as cutting back on paper consumption by allowing tablet use during Diet question and answer sessions, as well as permitting female legislators to vote online from home or hospitals when they are pregnant or giving birth.
While both the ruling and opposition blocs have recognized the need to slash paper use, some in the LDP have voiced reservations about out-of-chamber votes by female legislators on the grounds that it could run counter to constitutional provisions about voting by Diet members present. It thus appears difficult to introduce online voting before the turn of the Imperial era from Heisei to Reiwa at the stroke of 12 a.m. on May 1.
Furthermore, a proposal to hold debate between the prime minister and opposition party leaders at night so more members of the public can view it live on TV has barely been discussed this session.
The lack of progress in Diet reform discussion owes much to a lack of LDP enthusiasm, but some in the opposition camp are also reluctant, as striking any accord with the ruling coalition could dampen the administration-opposition showdown ahead of the upper house race. Given the current state of affairs, advancing Diet reform debate looks rather unlikely.
What is even more serious is the fact that legislators have not addressed a fundamental question: What is the Diet's raison d'etre?
Lower house Speaker Tadamori Oshima released a July 2018 statement questioning whether the Diet had engaged in legislative activity and the monitoring of administrative branches in a manner meeting its public mandate. The document urged both the ruling and opposition camps to seriously reflect on their actions.
The statement signified a profound sense of crisis over the Diet's insufficient responses to scandals. These included the Ministry of Finance's doctoring of documents on the heavily discounted sale of state land to Moritomo Gakuen, a school operator that had ties with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's wife Akie.
Alas, the current Diet session has also had such shortcomings. First among them is the failure to reveal the whole picture of statistical irregularities at the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare that caused tens of millions of people to be shortchanged a total of tens of billions of yen in work-related benefits.
The parliamentary investigation has been lagging mainly due to government foot-dragging on opposition camp requests for relevant documents. Prime Minister Abe is also to blame for hindering substantial deliberations on the issue by spending so much time talking about irrelevant topics instead of squarely answering questions.
As Oshima pointed out, the Diet's biggest role is to keep tabs on the government, and this must supersede ruling-opposition barriers. The LDP itself should make harsher demands of party head Prime Minister Abe and other higher-ups.
The longstanding question about the role-sharing between the upper and lower houses has also been left unaddressed. The only change the upper chamber has seen of late is a seat number increase, which the LDP prioritized to serve its own interests.
Just as the nation is bracing for the upper house contest, the legislature should ask itself this essential question: What is the upper chamber about?

Questions remain as to why Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appointed Yoshitaka Sakurada as Olympics minister in October last year, and why he took more than six months to dismiss the gaffe-prone Cabinet member.
Abe admitted that he was responsible for appointing Sakurada to his Cabinet, but the dismissal came too late.
The sacking of Sakurada was prompted by the minister's remarks at a fundraising party for Hinako Takahashi, a ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) member of the House of Representatives. Sakurada suggested that efforts to secure Takahashi's re-election should be prioritized over restoration of areas hit by the 2011 quake, tsunami and nuclear disaster. "Ms. Takahashi is more important than restoration. Please extend your assistance," he told the gathering in Tokyo on April 10.
Sakurada was obviously attempting to flatter Takahashi. However, he apparently failed to consider how those affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake would feel about such a remark.
The government characterizes the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics in 2020 as events to support recovery from the triple disasters that hit eastern and northeastern Japan in March 2011. The remark shows that Sakurada, a Cabinet minister responsible for the Tokyo Games, did not even understand the significance of holding the event.
Sakurada earlier came under fire for saying he was "disappointed" when top Japanese swimmer Rikako Ikee announced she was suffering from leukemia. Recalling this gaffe during a speech at the April 10 party, he jokingly said, "For me, the word 'disappointed' is a taboo word." His comments leave us dumbfounded.
Sakurada also repeatedly mispronounced the names of people and places, as well as the amount of budget funds allocated for policy measures, and made remarks that show he badly lacked knowledge of cybersecurity despite being the minister in charge of this field. Bureaucrats often extended a helping hand to Sakurada when the minister was unable to answer questions in Diet deliberations. Members of the public have often witnessed such scenes since he assumed his position in October 2018.
Nevertheless, the prime minister stopped short of sacking Sakurada until recently. Abe apparently feared that the dismissal of Sakurada would spark questions over why Finance Minister Taro Aso had not resigned over his ministry's doctoring of documents on the heavily discounted sale of land to Moritomo Gakuen, a school operator previously linked to Abe's wife -- possibly leading to the resignation of more members of his Cabinet.
Many members of the public have sneered at Sakurada, who repeated incoherent and inconsistent statements in Diet deliberations. They questioned whether he was qualified to serve as a Cabinet minister, deepening the public's distrust in politics. Sakurada's responsibility for that is serious.
When he reshuffled his Cabinet in autumn last year, Prime Minister Abe said he appointed the right people to the right positions. However, with the exception of key positions, he actually appointed legislators recommended by intraparty factions to many Cabinet posts, including Sakurada. Until now, the prime minister had not held Cabinet members responsible for problems they were involved in, contributing to looseness within his administration.
The dismissal of Sakurada came shortly after state land minister Ichiro Tsukada stepped down for his remarks that could be construed as influence-peddling regarding a road construction project connecting the home prefectures of Abe and Aso. The prime minister has repeatedly pointed to the need for officials to keep on their toes. However, the looseness of his administration has reached an alarming level.

Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko were married 60 years ago on April 10. Members of the Imperial Family and the heads of the three branches of government were to celebrate the Imperial Couple's 60th wedding anniversary celebration at the Imperial Palace today.
Looking back on the footprints left by Empress Michiko, who will be addressed by the title Empress Emeritus upon Emperor Akihito's abdication of the throne on April 30, we cannot but feel how significant her presence has been.
When Empress Michiko's engagement to then Crown Prince Akihito was announced in 1958 when she was 24 years old, it stirred up "Michiko mania" across Japan. Many people welcomed the country's first crown princess not from a former Imperial or aristocratic family, but from the public.
The new Constitution that went into effect after World War II declared that "marriage shall be based only on the mutual consent of both sexes and it shall be maintained through mutual cooperation with the equal rights of husband and wife as a basis." The marriage between Their Majesties was seen as the arrival of a new era that would bring an end to old traditions and order. Japan was about to enter a period of rapid economic growth, with a white paper on the Japanese economy noting two years prior that the country was no longer in the "postwar period."
It was also the first time that a Japanese Imperial couple kept their children with them and brought them up themselves. When footage of the close-knit family was televised, the public saw them as the ideal modern family.
Until then, children in the Imperial Family were not raised directly by their parents, but rather by wet nurses and tutors. Thus, Crown Prince Naruhito will be the first to accede to the Imperial Throne as an emperor who grew up with his own parents.
Empress Michiko has always kept close to her heart a children's story of a snail that was told to her by an adult when she was a child. One day, the snail realizes that the shell on its back is filled with sorrow. It tells its friends of its sorrow, but everyone replies, "My back, too, is filled with sorrow."
Empress Michiko spoke about the effect this story had on her at a keynote speech she gave through video for the International Board on Books for Young People Congress held in New Delhi, India, in 1998. She said that as a young girl, "I even had at times some vague uneasy intimations that just to go on living was no easy thing. In spite of that, I certainly did not dislike this story."
The sensitive girl grew up to be a sensitive adult, and as Empress, she continued to offer support to those who were carrying heavy loads of sorrow with them.
As Japan entered the Heisei period, the economy plunged into a long period of stagnation, and the country was hit by countless disasters. At the same time, the Japanese public's interest in the Imperial Family rose.
The Imperial Couple visited areas that were struck hard by disasters, where they got on their knees to speak to and encourage people who were staying in evacuation centers. The Emperor and Empress also visited welfare facilities and Hansen's disease sanatoriums on numerous occasions.
Empress Michiko continued to support Emperor Akihito, who has always been exploring what it means to be the symbol of the state in the Heisei era. Whenever the Emperor went to honor the dead both domestically and overseas, or visited remote islands, the Empress was by his side. She has been a constant companion of the Emperor's long journey.
Empress Michiko's words have reflected a broad understanding of Japan's modernization and postwar history.
On her birthday in 2013, she referred to the so-called Itsukaichi draft constitution, which was composed in Tokyo's Tama region in western Tokyo, ahead of the promulgation of the Meiji Constitution. It incorporated the concepts of basic human rights and equality before the law, and Empress Michiko said she had been extremely impressed by it.
On the same occasion, Empress Michiko also mentioned the name of her close friend, Beate Sirota Gordon, who passed away in 2012, as someone who had incorporated respect toward women's human rights in Japan in the new Japanese Constitution. An American woman in the Government Section of the General Headquarters of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, Gordon was responsible for drafting portions of the Japanese Constitution clearly indicating equality of the sexes.
Her life as empress has not always been easy, however. In 1993, a series of articles bashing the Empress, mostly in sensationalist weekly magazines, led to a decline in her health.
On her 84th birthday in October of last year, she looked back on her years in the Imperial Family and told the press, "Living as Crown Princess and later Empress was not an easy one for me by any means."
At his final birthday news conference of the Heisei era, Emperor Akihito said, his voice wavering at times, "I am ... truly grateful to the Empress, who herself was once one of the people, but who chose to walk this path with me, and over 60 long years continued to serve with great devotion both the Imperial Family and the people of Japan." It was a sincere expression of the Emperor's deep trust and gratitude for the Empress.
Empress Michiko exhibits a rich sensibility in the tanka poetry that she writes on various occasions. One poem she has penned is about Yuta Minagawa, who was just 2 years old when he was miraculously rescued after his mother and older sister were killed in a landslide triggered by the 2004 Niigata-Chuetsu Earthquake. She writes, almost as if she is a relieved mother, how the stars looked over the child, who had been buried in the mud for some 90 hours, and returned him back to his home.
In the country's darkest times, when Japan had to overcome the most sorrowful of experiences and continue forging ahead, Empress Michiko created a new model for the role of empress.

Osaka Ishin no Kai (Osaka Restoration Association), a regional political party promoting the plan to restructure the western Japan city of Osaka into a metropolis like Tokyo, won both the Osaka gubernatorial and mayoral elections on April 7.
Ichiro Matsui and Hirofumi Yoshimura stepped down as governor and mayor, respectively, and called a double election to coincide with the first round of nationwide local elections and to seek re-election in each other's positions. With their victories, Yoshimura is set to become Osaka governor and Matsui will assume the post of mayor.
They are poised to work on the metro Osaka plan to split the city of Osaka into special wards with publicly elected mayors and assemblies like Tokyo's 23 wards. The plan is designed to reduce functional overlaps between the prefectural and municipal governments.
Osaka Ishin no Kai called the double election in a bid to break a deadlock over the plan after its negotiations over the matter with Komeito, a junior ruling coalition partner in the national government, broke down.
Matsui and Yoshimura's strategy of seeking to switch their positions in order to gain full four-year terms was a point of contention during the campaigning. Under Public Offices Election Act provisions, if Matsui and Yoshimura had stepped down and won re-election in their original positions, they could only stay on until November and December, the ends of their original terms, respectively.
Putting aside their contrived efforts to serve the interests of their party, the election outcome should be viewed as local residents' expression of certain levels of support for the metro Osaka plan. Residents' strong backing for the regional party's policies since it was founded by former Osaka Gov. and Mayor Toru Hashimoto, including its administrative and fiscal reforms, have been reconfirmed in the election.
The Liberal Democratic Party, the ruling party in national politics, and other major political parties effectively fielded joint candidates but failed to defeat Osaka Ishin-backed candidates, highlighting the LDP's fragile support base in Osaka.
Following the election results, Matsui and Yoshimura will likely speed up their moves to hold a referendum on the metro Osaka plan. Still, the referendum proposal needs approval from the Osaka prefectural and municipal assemblies. A legal counsel comprising members of the prefectural and municipal assemblies and others will draw up a specific plan and the assemblies will vote on it.
The metropolis proposal was rejected in a 2015 local referendum when Hashimoto was serving as Osaka mayor. If Matsui and Yoshimura intend to ask local voters to make judgment on the plan again, it goes without saying that they should endeavor to build a consensus within the assemblies to improve the idea and convince local residents.
During the campaigns for the April 7 election, Matsui and Yoshimura stopped short of presenting any specific proposals on the metro Osaka plan. Since they have won four-year terms, they can secure a sufficient amount of time for discussions.
Those involved in discussions on the metro Osaka initiative have thus far criticized each other and failed to have calm policy debate.
Even though Matsui and Yoshimura won the double election it does not mean that their ends-justify-the-means method was supported by the people of Osaka. In democracy, a process of forming a consensus is important. It must be kept in mind that particularly in local autonomy, the head of the executive branch and the assembly are like two wheels of a bike.

The Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office served a fresh arrest warrant on Carlos Ghosn on suspicion of aggravated breach of trust in violation of the Companies Act, less than one month after the former Nissan Motor Co. chairman was freed on bail.
Ghosn was released on March 6, 108 days after his initial arrest. It is extremely rare for someone on bail to be detained again after such a short span.
The repeated arrests and detention of Ghosn have raised criticism that law enforcers are practicing "hostage justice," and the question now is whether the latest warrant -- the fourth -- can withstand such condemnation.
Just a day before his April 4 re-arrest, Ghosn opened an official Twitter account and tweeted, "I'm getting ready to tell the truth about what's happening. Press conference on Thursday, April 11."

Japan's judicial system is notorious for hostage justice, in which a suspect remains in detention for a prolonged period unless they "confess" to their alleged crimes. By depriving the suspect of freedom over a lengthy duration, it is thought to make it easier for law enforcers to elicit depositions in line with their own theories of the crime -- a long-running practice in Japan.

At a press conference, a lawyer representing Ghosn blasted the prosecutors' tactics, saying, "It constitutes hostage justice as they (prosecutors) are pressuring him by leveraging his detention."

Ghosn is accused of remitting some 563 million yen to a company he effectively owns by way of a Nissan sales agent in Oman, causing financial damage to the auto giant. Part of the funds was allegedly spent on the purchase of a pleasure boat used by the Ghosn family.

The case should be closely investigated as suspected misappropriation of Nissan funds. Meanwhile, some have called the other charges against Ghosn, including false entries in his financial statements, as mere "crimes in form."

Investigations into Ghosn's criminal responsibility are underway both in Japan and France. Renault SA has alerted French prosecutors to Ghosn's murky expenditures.

Yet even within the Tokyo prosecution office, some had reservations about slapping Ghosn with the fourth arrest warrant, worried it would draw further foreign media criticism over his lengthy detention. Those prosecutors insisted on laying additional charges against Ghosn only after investigating him on a voluntary basis.

Meanwhile, other prosecutors were apparently frustrated over a court decision granting Ghosn's request for bail when investigations into his alleged crimes were still underway.

Suspects and defendants are arrested and detained solely to prevent them from escaping or destroying evidence. Therefore, whether their actions meet prerequisites for extended detention should be strictly evaluated before it is implemented.

One is tempted to wonder why the fresh compulsory investigation was necessary for Ghosn, who was living under strict bail conditions, including installation of monitoring cameras at his residence. Prosecutors are urged to fulfill their responsibility to demonstrate the need for the latest arrest through further investigations and upcoming trials.