Asia | Japan and money politics

Shameless shogun

Japan fondly recalls a corrupt former prime minister

Kaku-san paid cash
|TOKYO

IT WAS a favourite boast of the late Kakuei Tanaka, a former leader of Japan, that he won his first cabinet job in 1957 by giving the then prime minister, Nobusuke Kishi, a small backpack filled with ¥3m (perhaps $70,000 in today’s money). As Tanaka’s stature in Japanese politics grew, so did the size of his bribes: eventually he needed large metal suitcases. Two years after he resigned as prime minister in 1974, following accusations of dodgy property deals, he was arrested for pocketing $1.8m in bribes ($8.7m today) from America’s Lockheed Corporation, a defence contractor.

Forty years on, Japan is gripped by nostalgia for Kaku-san, as he is fondly known. A slew of recent books and articles lionise him. In this year’s “Genius”, a bestselling book about Tanaka written in the first person, as if he were still alive and doling out construction contracts, Shintaro Ishihara, a retired right-wing politician and former Tokyo governor, argues that politicos nowadays just lack his class. Others praise his common touch and ability to get things done: he was known as “the bulldozer with a computer”. An editor at one of the Japanese tabloids that have been churning out articles praising Kaku-san believes his readers would vote for him if he were alive today.

What does this mania for a dead, corrupt politician say about contemporary Japan? Mainly it highlights the Japanese public’s profound disenchantment with today’s careful politics and bland politicians. Contemporary leaders, writes Eiji Oshita, an author, are “tasteless like distilled water”.

It suggests a particular distaste for the current prime minister, Shinzo Abe, who is Kishi’s grandson, and unlike Kaku-san often struggles to connect with ordinary folk. Akira Nakano, an 87-year-old businessman from Tokyo who recently bought Mr Ishihara’s book, dislikes Mr Abe but complains that there is no viable opposition to vote for.

The mania also shows that Japan has a deep tolerance for bribery scandals, especially those involving popular politicians. Jitsuwa Bunka Taboo, which is better known for nude pictures and gossip about gangsters, was among the few publications to bring up Kaku-san’s corruption. Of all the greedy politicians who had a knack for lining up supporters, it wrote, Tanaka was the worst. The more common view is Mr Ishihara’s: that was how politics worked back then, and Kaku-san was an effective politician. Few may want to live in such times, but many miss them, and the characters they bred.

This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline "Shameless shogun"

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