A Quick Introduction

On September 16th, 2020, Yoshihide Suga was voted in by parliament to become the new Prime Minister of Japan, after Shinzo Abe resigned. 

At 71 years old, Suga has been involved with the Japanese government for years, slowly working his way up in the political world, and now he is the new Prime Minister of Japan, but where did his career with politics start?

Born in the Akita Prefecture on December 6th, 1948, Suga has been involved in Japanese politics since 1975, where he accepted a job as secretary of Hikosaburo Okonogi, a former member of the house of representatives from Yokohama. From then, Suga continued his rise in political power, becoming a council member for Yokohama from 1987 – 1996. From then on he worked with the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) as the deputy secretary-general, eventually being appointed the senior vice-minister of Internal Affairs and Communications by former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi in 2005.

After being appointed in 2005, Suga continued to keep a close relationship with the government officials, eventually being in Shinzo Abe’s first cabinet during Abe’s first term as prime minister in 2007. Since 2007, Suga served as Abe’s right-hand man, being named Minister in charge of significant events like the abduction situation between Japan and North Korea in 2018, announcing the era of Japan’s new Emperor Naruhito, and in September becoming the leader of the political party he started working with back in 2001 before eventually becoming Japan’s new Prime Minister. Yoshihide Suga has been working behind the scenes in the political world for over a half-century now. But as the new Prime Minister, how will he do on the center stage of Japan’s ministry cabinet?

Other Facts

• In 2018, Suga met the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
• He has worked for two Prime Ministers of Japan, Junichiro Koizumi, and Shinzo Abe
• In 2019, he traveled to the US to meet Vice President Mike Pence
• Has been involved in Japanese politics for 55 years (since 1975)
• Suga is the longest-serving chief cabinet secretary in Japanese History

My Own Thoughts

I am half Japanese, my mother being fully Japanese and when I started paying more attention to politics as I got older, I also started looking more into Japanese politics as well. I was always used to seeing Shinzo Abe as the Prime Minister of Japan and hearing his announcement of resignation due to health issues was a pretty surprising thing to hear. I wanted to look more into Yoshihide Suga because he was someone I never heard of before and after doing more research, I realized that he was someone always in the background, and I wanted to look into his political history that built Suga’s resume to be the new Prime Minister.

Sources

• CNN Editorial Research. “Yoshihide Suga Fast Facts.” CNN World, CNN, 13 Oct. 2020, www.cnn.com/2020/10/13/asia/yoshihide-suga-fast-facts/index.html.
• Westcott, Ben, and Yoko Wakatsuki. “Yoshihide Suga officially named as Japan’s new Prime Minister, replacing Shinzo Abe.” CNN World, CNN, 16 Sept. 2020, www.cnn.com/2020/09/16/asia/yoshihide-suga-japan-prime-minister-intl-hnk/index.html.