Suzuki's fall from grace: Breaking political society

The Asahi Shimbun, Tokyo

Suzuki knew just how the inner circle of government works, and he knew how to swagger before bureaucrats and bend them to his will.

Muneo Suzuki, a Lower House member, was arrested Wednesday despite his protestations of innocence. He insists he has done nothing wrong and has vowed to fight, seemingly not comprehending why he has been targeted so viciously.

His guilt or innocence is up to a court to determine. What is certain, though, is that it is time for him to get out of politics.

His fall from grace began with the way he dealt with a nongovernmental organization early this year. When an international conference was held in January in Tokyo for helping Afghanistan's reconstruction, he forcibly tried to prevent the presence of the representative of a nongovernmental organization at the conference by twisting the arms of Foreign Ministry officials.

He bullied government officials and junior Diet colleagues even as he sought to sway them by fawning and entreaties. As a deputy chief Cabinet secretary, Suzuki knew just how the inner circle of government works, and he knew how to swagger before bureaucrats and bend them to his will.

From that perspective, he must have found it embarrassing that his meddling in a decision to allow a certain nongovernmental organization to attend an international conference stirred up such a fuss.

One reason his actions drew so much attention at the time was his high-profile feud with Makiko Tanaka, then the foreign minister. But there was more.

Nongovernmental organizations are groups of people who work in international forums. But Suzuki tried to move in the NGO realm with the same kind of brute force he had applied in the parochial world of Nagata-cho politics. He was, of course, outclassed among those with broad perspective, and he was immediately thrown on the defensive.

Kensuke Onishi, who led the NGO that Suzuki detested so vehemently, went public in detail with his dealings with the lawmaker. Suzuki, bound by the logic of the closed world of politics, was thrown off guard. It was obvious which man-Suzuki or Onishi-drew the most public support.

The fray touched off revelations of innumerable suspicions of other Suzuki meddling, and he emerged as the poster child for a narrow, outmoded society. Whenever a new suspicion of his wrongdoing cropped up, Suzuki seemed perplexed, as if he could not understand what he was doing wrong, and launched ferocious counterattacks.

Around the same time, the Foreign Ministry and the Defense Agency generated a stunning series of blunders. Lies told by food companies regarding product labeling were unearthed one after another, and one banking giant born of mergers of banks was so inept it could not even successfully move money among the accounts of its own clients. In this way, many closed societies have started to fray at the seams at about the same time.

Then came Suzuki's arrest. There was an audible sigh of relief from government and the LDP alike at the prospect of this difficult affair finally being over and done. But there is a price to be paid for what Suzuki has done. And the problem is not solely a Suzuki problem.

Those who function in a world supported by traditional, characteristic Japanese society apply a kind of logic that holds up only among insiders-the protection of vested interests, limits based upon convention, mutual back-scratching and clannishness. Within those inner circles, the players know that such behavior cannot be sustained indefinitely, yet they become complacent in the notion that things are not so bad after all.

So Suzuki's arrest represents a step forward. A groundswell that breathes new life is inevitable, even in politics. How can Suzuki, now cornered, continue to mutter, "I don't understand"?