Japan's PM says he'll resign once nuclear crisis overcome

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Japan's natural disaster and nuclear crises have now spawned a full-blown political one, with Prime Minister Naoto Kan bowing to pressure and promising to resign later this year.

Members of Mr. Kan's Democratic Party of Japan said the prime minister, who has come under fire for his sometimes uncertain leadership since a massive earthquake and tsunami struck Japan's east coast on March 11, agreed Thursday to step down at an unspecified date in the near future, as soon as the further steps were taken to ease the still-critical situation at the Fukushima nuclear plant.

Mr. Kan made the concession just hours before he was to face a no-confidence motion in Japan's parliament, the Diet, during which factions of his own party were expected to vote against the government. The push to oust Mr. Kan was initiated by the opposition Liberal Democratic Party, but gained momentum when two former DPJ leaders, Ichiro Ozawa and Yukio Hatoyama, indicated they would support the no-confidence motion.

Mr. Kan's offer to resign spared him the indignity of being forced from office, but his promise to resign sets the stage for Japan to see its sixth prime minister since Junichiro Koizumi stepped down in September 2006.

"Rightly or wrongly, a widespread view has developed that the Kan government has badly mismanaged the crisis. At the same time, major power brokers in his own party have been plotting these last few months to force him out," said Ken Courtis, a lecturer at Keio University and Tokyo University.

Mr. Courtis said that while polls show Mr. Kan's popularity had plunged since the tsunami - to less than 30 per cent according to one recent survey - the vast majority of Japanese don't support change of leadership in the current situation. Towns across northeastern Japan remains in ruins three months after the tsunami, and more than 20,000 people have been declared dead or missing.

Meanwhile, the situation at the Fukushima nuclear plant - judged the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986 - continues to emit radiation and the government recently expanded the evacuation zone around the four crippled reactors.

The tsunami and nuclear disasters combined to help knock Japan's economy back into recession in the first quarter of 2011. Now, Japan appears headed for escalated political infighting, maybe even another election.

"I feel anger at politicians who are engaged in (such) actions," Tamotsu Baba, the mayor of Namie, a town of 22,000 that was evacuated because of its proximity to the Fukushima plant, told the Asahi Shimbun newspaper before the no-confidence vote. "They should first make every effort to settle the situation at the nuclear plant."

Some analysts, however, believe Mr. Kan may not leave office any time soon. In televised remarks, he said only that he would "pass on various responsibilities to the younger generation" but only "once I have accomplished my role."