Editorial

Hosokawa's responsibility

Until last week, prime minister Morihiro Hosokawa, was like a meteor in the sky of Japanese politics. He went to the highest government position like a celestial body. And, like one, he fell to the earth as he burned. He left behind disillusioned supporters, who had pinned so much hope on his plan to reform the country's politics. Hosokawa resigned on Friday after he failed to prove himself as clean as the politics he would try to create.

A few months after he stepped into the Japanese political limelight, Hosokawa gave an impression that he was the leader Japan needed today. He had been a successful and decent politician and represented the post-World War II generation. He had successfully conducted a reform of local politics and was expected to inject new blood and ideas into the country's scandal-prone political life. The Japanese desire for the reform he promised was made clear by the turn away from the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), who had ruled the country for four decades, towards his inexperience coalition.

During the first months of his administration the Japanese were very optimistic and Hosokawa's poll ratings reached 70 percent, the highest a prime minister has carried there since World War II. To East Asian nations, he was the first Japanese leader who tried to eliminate the psychological barriers Japan continued to face in its relationships with them, by rendering an apology for his country's atrocities during the World War II.

He became a study in how fickle popularity can be. After he was linked to Sagawa Kyubin, a trucking company involved in a payoff scandal, Hosokawa's popularity plummeted.

Now the question is why Japanese politics have been so corrupt for the past 20 years, and why they have been so happy to accept material wealth from business people, who have a taste for buying influence from members of the political elite.

These are perhaps questions for the Japanese to answer, but for us, Indonesians, the way Japanese leaders take responsibility for their mistakes -- for example by quitting their posts -- another question is posed.

Although many have been involved in scandals, Japanese politicians still expected to be beacons of moral responsibility. They feel shame for their mistakes and uphold the virtue of responsibility, whether or not a court would prove their guilt.

Ironically, our nation, which is always so proud of its traditional and moral values, has seen virtue fade away after it was so much respected by politicians when they experimented with parliamentary democracy in the 1950s.

Now, officials like to say that leaving one's job is not an Indonesian way of demonstrating responsibility. This attitude has been demonstrated by the absence of officials willing to stand up and be counted for a number of serious scandals, including Bapindo. Seven years ago, when two commuter trains collided at Bintaro, South Jakarta killing 136 passengers, those asked to shoulder the responsibility were poor workers whose monthly salaries did not exceed Rp 40,000 (US$19) each.

It is time for individuals in positions of authority, like Morohiro Hosokawa, to stop passing the buck and become accountable for their actions.