【英语国际】鸠山接班人盘点：财相菅直人希望最大

Naoto Kan, Japan's deputy prime minister and finance minister, is the front runner to take the reins from Yukio Hatoyama, who resigned as prime minister Wednesday.

Japan's ruling Democratic Party of Japan is set to hold a leadership election in the next few days. 'A power void cannot be allowed. We will hold a leadership election in the coming days,' said Ryu Matsumoto, head of the DPJ lawmakers' assembly.

There are three main cabinet members who are candidates for the top post.

Mr. Kan, one of Japan's most popular politicians, is fiscally conservative, supports a weaker yen and a less-powerful bureaucracy for the economy. He has also been one of the leading voices warning of the dangers of deflation and has prodded the Bank of Japan to take more aggressive measures against falling prices.

Before becoming a politician, the 63-year old former civic activist rose to fame in the mid 1990s when he exposed, as Japan's health minister, the bureaucracy's responsibility for infecting thousands of hemophiliacs with HIV-tainted blood.

Seiji Maehara, Japan's young and ambitious transport minister, is another candidate for the top post and has made no secret of his ambitions to one day rule the country. Mr. Maehara, 48, has openly criticized Mr. Hatoyama and Ichiro Ozawa, the DPJ's secretary-general and most powerful politician within the party.

'I think [the fall in the approval ratings] is largely attributed to [Prime Minister Yukio] Hatoyama's lack of leadership, highlighted by the contentious issue of relocating the Futenma U.S. air base in Okinawa, as well as to the money politics involving the two leaders [Hatoyama and DPJ Secretary-General Ichiro Ozawa],' Mr. Maehara said earlier this week.

An only child, Mr Maehara attended both high school and the prestigious Kyoto University on scholarships. At 43, he became the youngest-ever person to head up the Democratic Party of Japan, which seized power in a landslide election last year after more than fifty years of uninterrupted rule by the conservative Liberal Democratic Party.

Another candidate for the top post is DPJ senior party heavyweight Katsuya Okada, the foreign minister, who lost his bid to become DPJ leader to now outgoing Prime Minister Hatoyama last May. Mr. Okada came to the party's forefront when the DPJ trumped Upper House elections while under his leadership in 2004, but was ousted from the position a year later when the party took a beating in the Lower House elections. Mr. Okada expressed stronger support to raise the unpopular 5% consumption tax during his run against Mr. Hatoyama last year, but has since scaled back the language.

鸠山由纪夫周三辞去日本首相职务后，副首相兼财务大臣菅直人(Naoto Kan)成了把握最大的接班人选。

在接下来几天，执政党日本民主党很可能举行一次领导人选举。日本国会的民主党领袖松本龙(Ryu Matsumoto)说，权力真空是不能允许出现的，我们将在未来几天举行一次领导人选举。

有望继任首相职位的有三位重要内阁成员。

菅直人是日本最受欢迎的政治家之一，在财政上属于保守派，支持弱势日圆，并主张放松对经济的管制。他也曾是警告通货紧缩风险的最重要声音之一，并曾推动日本央行(Bank of Japan)对物价的下跌采取更加激进的措施。

菅直人现年63岁，从政以前曾是公民活动家。上世纪90年代中期，他作为日本的厚生大臣，揭露了数千血友病患者被输含艾滋病毒血液事件中日本政府官僚作风应负的责任，因而一举成名。

另一位可能人选是日本年轻而有雄心的国土交通大臣前原诚司(Seiji Maehara)。他从不掩饰自己有朝一日统治全国的野心。前原诚司现年48岁，曾对鸠山和民主党干事长、党内权力最大的政治家小泽一郎(Ichiro Ozawa)提出公开批评。

前原诚司在本周早些时候说，我认为（支持率的下降），在很大程度上归因于鸠山领导力的缺乏，这在冲绳普天间美国空军基地的搬迁这个争议性问题上，在牵涉两位领导人（鸠山和小泽一郎）的政治献金问题上，都体现得很明显。

前原诚司是家中的独子，依靠奖学金上了高中和知名学府京都大学。在43岁的时候，他成为日本民主党史上最年轻的党首。去年，民主党以压倒性优势赢得选举成为执政党，打破了保守的自由民主党50多年连续执政的局面。

第三个首相人选是民主党资深党员、外务大臣冈田克也(Katsuya Okada)。去年5月份，冈田克也在角逐民主党党首时败给了鸠山。2004年，他领导下的民主党在参议院选举中获胜，使他走向前台；一年后，由于民主党在众议院选举中败落，又被逐出党首职位。去年和鸠山竞争时，冈田克也对提高5%消费税率（这个税率本已不受欢迎）的提议表达了更强烈的支持，但后来逐步减弱了这种声音。