Portraying himself as a reformer, popular vaccination minister Taro Kono yesterday promised to "move Japan forward" as he formally declared his candidacy in the race to succeed Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga.
The 58-year-old political princeling, whose father Yohei is best known for delivering the 1993 Kono Statement that first acknowledged wartime "comfort women", sought to burnish his reputation as someone who can get things done by emphasising his accomplishments over the past year.
Among other things, he has abolished the need for hanko seals for 99 per cent of the almost 14,700 procedures that had hampered Japan's digitalisation drive. He was also responsible for speeding up Covid-19 vaccinations - nearly half of all residents have been immunised despite a slow start.
Mr Kono, who is also Administrative Reform Minister, tried to show he was the best person to lead Japan out of a decades-long funk that has left the country lagging behind in areas such as innovation.
"I want to build a country where, in the face of the impossible, people will be willing to give it a shot and do things step by step to turn their goals into reality," he said at a press conference.
Mr Kono, a former defence and foreign minister, is the third to declare his candidacy for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) presidential election. Nomination day is on Sept 17, and party members will vote on Sept 29.
As the LDP and its coalition partner Komeito have majorities in both the Lower and Upper Houses, whoever wins the LDP election will be virtually guaranteed to become Japan's 100th prime minister. The winner will also lead the LDP into a general election that must be held by November.
Two others have already entered the fray. Former foreign minister Fumio Kishida, 64, has vowed to roll out a massive economic stimulus package and to break away from the "neoliberal policies" of recent decades that he said has suppressed wages.
Former internal affairs minister Sanae Takaichi, 60, is aiming to become Japan's first female premier.
She is the most hawkish of the trio, and has dismissed diplomatic opposition against visits to the war-linked Yasukuni Shrine as "foreign interference" and an "infringement of the freedom of religion".
Mr Kono is one of the most social media-savvy politicians in Japan, and he regularly tops media surveys as the public's preferred pick to be the next prime minister, given his reform-minded maverick image. He has won popular appeal through his candid tweets, though he courted controversy this week by blocking his critics on Twitter.
Yet he also appears to be the "continuity candidate" who is most aligned with the LDP's long-held policies on constitutional revision and issues such as North Korea abductions and Japan's territorial dispute with Russia.
In what is seen as a move to toe the LDP's policy line and not ruffle feathers, he made an abrupt policy U-turn this week on his long-held anti-nuclear platform.
He said that nuclear energy should be allowed insofar as the plants are certified safe, in the push for net-zero carbon by 2050.
