Source: Nippon.com As I have been weighed down by commitments to my Embassy duties, I haven’t been able to give close attention to the formation on Wednesday of the Second Abe Cabinet. The most prominent change in this new cabinet is the existence of 5 female cabinet members, making the Abe Cabinet unique among governments around the world (it certainly puts the Australian Cabinet to shame, with only one female cabinet minister). Nonetheless, the best analysis available in English on the cabinet changes come via Michael Cucek’s Shisaku blog, hence I’ll put a link here and trust that readers will take a look at Cucek’s description of each minister.
I agree with Cucek that having Ishiba in the role of Rural Revitalisation is particularly unusual, unless Ishiba merely plans to use that position to secure a greater proportion of rural votes before the next round of LDP party position elections in 2015. Eto Akinori as the new defence minister came as no surprise, although it did mean that Onodera Itsunori was shown the back door (he gave his farewell speech at the MoD on Thursday, and shed tears as he recalled his work with the SDF, a rare thing for former defence ministers to do (J). The full list of the Second Abe Cabinet can be found here (along with their electoral districts and past positions).
I agree with Cucek that having Ishiba in the role of Rural Revitalisation is particularly unusual, unless Ishiba merely plans to use that position to secure a greater proportion of rural votes before the next round of LDP party position elections in 2015. Eto Akinori as the new defence minister came as no surprise, although it did mean that Onodera Itsunori was shown the back door (he gave his farewell speech at the MoD on Thursday, and shed tears as he recalled his work with the SDF, a rare thing for former defence ministers to do (J). The full list of the Second Abe Cabinet can be found here (along with their electoral districts and past positions).
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