New law passed through Diet: Great step forward in politics
TOKYO: "A Diet member shall maintain probity in official duties and must not perform any acts that may incite doubts over their rectitude" -- so reads Article 1 of the conduct code that Diet members are supposed to abide by.
The code was enacted 15 years ago.
Yet there has been no end of acts that "incite doubts over their rectitude."
In particular, the money-linked scandals involving Diet members that come to light on an almost yearly basis have been a major factor behind the general public's loss in confidence in politics.
A law designed to outlaw political influence-peddling, which passed through the Diet earlier this week, prohibits politicians from accepting money from businesses or individuals in return for mediating with either central or local government officials.
We hope the passage of the new law will induce each and every politician to straighten up and make an effort to regain the public trust.
The law applies to Diet members, their state-funded secretaries, local government heads and local assembly members.
It prohibits politicians from profiting by using their authority on the request of businesses or individuals to influence public officials' decisions regarding project contracts and administrative actions of central and local governments.
If found guilty of profiting from their influence, politicians will face up to three years in prison and state-funded secretaries up to two years in prison.
When the bill proposing the law was still under Diet deliberation, the opposition camp demanded that the new law also make private secretaries subject to punishment. The ruling parties, however, refused to comply, saying that the new law should be in balance with a similar code -- already in place -- under which politicians can be punished for taking bribes in return for influence.
In practice, little difference exists between jobs performed by politicians' state-funded and their private secretaries.
Some Diet members have already expressed their intentions to leave all mediations that may become subject to the new law up to their private secretaries.
It will run counter to the spirit of the new law if politicians and others subject to the law seek loopholes.
Such behavior will only aggravate the already rampant public distrust in politics and must be averted by any means.
The natural thing to do is to revise the law when shortcomings come to light after it goes into effect.
We must be vigilant in our efforts to apply the law not only to prevent corruption but also to renovate the basic nature of politics.
As if living up to one top coalition member's characterization of politicians as "animals that mediate," some Diet members reportedly have allocated most of their daily political activities to mediating requests for their supporters and industrial organizations in their constituencies with the appropriate government organs.
In that reflecting the popular will in public administration is an important political activity in itself, we should not indiscriminately label this mediating behavior inappropriate.
Far more significant, however, is a macroscopic perspective -- in which politicians take into account the interests of the state and entire regions in their political activities.
In other words, the main responsibility of Diet members is to draft and put into practice policies that concern such fundamental national interests as the economy, the state coffers, foreign relations, national security and energy.
The nation's recent period of general stagnation, which has been dubbed the "lost decade," can be attributed to politicians' failure to give serious thought to what the nation should be. Instead, they have been absorbed in seeking their own profits in their spheres of influence.
All concerned should do their utmost to put an end to what can be described as the shirking of political responsibility as soon as possible.
It is known that citizens often ask the politicians representing them to use their influence to seek preferential treatment in such private matters as arranging ceremonial events, including weddings and funerals, and securing employment.
If politicians are tied up with such requests from voters, they hardly are able to carry out their political duties in a macroscopic perspective.
Thus, we urge not only politicians but also voters to fully comprehend the new law's objectives.
-- The Yomiuri Shimbun/Asia News Network