Japan PM faces party revolt
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Japan's centre-left Premier Naoto Kan, in power just seven months, faced a mutiny from a small group of party lawmakers on Thursday that threatened his reform agenda and weakened his leadership.
Sixteen lawmakers loyal to Kan's internal party rival, scandal-tainted powerbroker Ichiro Ozawa, asked to leave the party's grouping within parliament and signalled they may not support the party in votes on crucial laws.
The rebels said they were acting in protest at Kan's lack of leadership and his failure to meet the original pledges of the Democratic Party of Japan, which swept to power in 2009, ending a half-century of conservative rule.
The party executive rejected their request — but their bold move threw a spotlight on a deepening split within Kan's DPJ at a time when voter support has plunged below 20 percent, according to recent opinion polls.
Kan, who took power last June, has struggled to tackle pressing economic and social problems at a time when the conservative opposition controls the upper house of parliament and has threatened to block crucial legislation.
Japan's economy, in the doldrums for two decades and under the cloud of a greying population, was overtaken last year by China as Asia's biggest economy and faces stiff competition from emerging export powerhouse South Korea.
Kan, Japan's fifth premier in five years, has pledged to drive tough reforms through a divided parliament, to spur growth and reduce a public debt mountain that is twice the size of the five-trillion-dollar economy.
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