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On October 29, DPJ President Katsuya Okada held his regular press conference at party headquarters. He commented on the relocation of Futenma Air Station, the supplementary budget, and the forthcoming trilateral summit between the leaders of Japan, China and the Republic of Korea (ROK).
With relation to Futenma, Minister of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, Keiichi Ishii had decided on October 28 to suspend Okinawa Governor Takeshi Onaga’s cancellation of the permit to allow landfill construction to take place in the Henoko coastal strip and, on October 29, the landfill construction commenced. Okada commented on this: “I have been saying that the government should properly engage with Okinawa and hold discussions with them. It is extremely regrettable that work on the main construction site has started. As a party, the DPJ is totally opposed to construction work starting in this fashion.” He added, “If such methods continue to be employed, the gap between Okinawa prefecture and the Abe government will only deepen, and we will end up reaching a point of no return.”
Okada also commented on a prospective supplementary budget, saying, “I do not intend to deny the need for compiling a supplementary budget itself”, but pointed out, “The reason I feel there is a risk in the government’s compiling a supplementary budget in order to realize a ‘society in which all 100 million citizens are dynamically engaged’ is that the government has not explained exactly what they mean by this phrase.” Okada also stated that while the Prime Minister is using catchy phrases like “raising the birthrate to 1.8 children per woman and eliminating cases in which people have no choice but to leave their jobs to provide nursing care [for family members]” he was concerned that the government had made no explanation of how such goals would be achieved. He expressed resignations with this, saying, “I can’t understand why the government is letting talk of the supplementary budget take on a life of its own, even though they have not yet mapped out the essentials of how they will realize these targets. I am concerned that it may be a case of them deciding that since the financing for a supplementary budget is available they will use it as a shotgun budget.”
Okada also commented on the forthcoming trilateral summit between the leaders of Japan, China and the ROK, saying, “I have been saying that leadership summits should take place with both China and the ROK at the earliest opportunity without any preconditions, and have emphasized that it is meaningful for such meetings to take place regularly even if there is no particular issue that demands attention. In that sense I think that it is particularly satisfactory that a meeting between the leaders of Japan and the ROK, which has not been held since the launch of the Abe administration, should be realized.” He called on both sides to “eliminate the suspicion that currently exists in both Japan and the ROK and work to build a real relationship of trust.”
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