DPJ to set up new Cabinet post for key policymaking bureau

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TOKYO, Aug. 25 Kyodo -
Japan's leading opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan, is looking to
create a new Cabinet portfolio to oversee its planned new policymaking bureau
if it wins power in Sunday's House of Representatives election, DPJ officials
said Tuesday.
The state minister for what would be called the ''National Strategy Bureau''
will likely also concurrently be the party's policy chief and will support the
prime minister in mapping out budgets as well as basic foreign and national
security policies, according to the officials.
In its campaign platform for the upcoming election, the DPJ pledges to set up
the bureau as a key pillar of a new administration to ensure a policymaking
process that is less dependent on bureaucrats and design policies under the
control of the premier.
The party plans to abolish the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy, a body
set up in January 2001 with the aim of granting the premier's office more power
in controlling fiscal policymaking and reining in bureaucratic influence.
But senior DPJ members have said the council has been virtually managed by
Finance Ministry officials.
The bureau will likely have a total workforce of 30 including 10 or fewer Diet
members. The remaining 20 are expected to include heads of local municipalities
as well as scholars and bureaucrats specializing in economic, fiscal and
foreign policies.
The DPJ would initially launch a National Strategy Office at what would be its
first Cabinet meeting in mid-September.
It is set to make an overall review of the budgetary request guidelines for
fiscal 2010 already decided by Prime Minister Taro Aso's Cabinet.
==Kyodo
2009-08-25 20:54:21