World

Mori Takes The Reins

April 4, 2000 / 9:46 AM EDT / AP

Yoshiro Mori, who has known former Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi since their college days at the prestigious Waseda University, is credited with the same skills as his friend: a strong consensus-builder who knows how to handle people.

After winning Wednesday's vote for Liberal Democratic Party president and the subsequent prime minister election in Parliament, he is expected to face strong pressure to continue Obuchi's approach.

Party leaders are unlikely to push for dramatic changes in direction in the run-up to Japan's high-profile hosting of the G-8 summit of leading industrial nations and Russia this summer.

"Maintaining current policy will be a top priority," said Michio Royama, a political scientist at Tokyo's Sophia University. "The leaders will make sure nothing changes."

Mori's background suggests anything but a rabble-rouser.

He is secretary-general of the conservative LDP, making him the second-highest figure in the party that has ruled Japan with one brief interruption since the 1950s.

Mori, 62, a native of Ishikawa Prefecture on the Japan Sea coast, started his career as a journalist in 1960 with the conservative Sankei newspaper. He was first elected to Parliament in 1969 and has served 10 terms.

Mori, a longtime insider in Japan's ruling party, was appointed deputy chief cabinet secretary in 1977 and named vice secretary-general of the LDP in 1978. He also served as LDP general council chief and was the party's top policy-maker before becoming secretary general in 1998.

He has broad experience in government. Mori served as education minister in 1983-1984, international trade and industry minister in 1992-1993 and construction minister in 1995-1996.

One of Mori's biggest challenges on taking office would be to keep Japan's economy on the path to recovery from its longest slump in decades.

Analysts expect he will try to temper some of the public works spending that Obuchi pushed through during his term in office to push the economy into recovery. Japan is now saddled with an enormous budget deficit.