Tokyo: Most Japanese want a new prime minister to lead the massive rebuilding needed after last month's earthquake and tsunami, newspaper polls showed on Monday, as the head of government was again scolded in parliament for his handling of the disaster.
Japan is also struggling to bring the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant under control after it was damaged by the March 11 natural disasters and began leaking radiation, a process that could take the rest of the year.
Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (Tepco) said on Sunday it hoped to achieve a cold shutdown to make the reactors stable within six to nine months. Full recovery could take even longer, the government has said, while rebuilding the shattered northeastern coast has yet to begin.
The cost of material damages alone from the quake and tsunami has been estimated at $300 billion, (Dh1,101 billion) making it the world's most costly natural disaster. More than 13,000 people have been confirmed dead, and tens of thousands made homeless.
Pulled up in Parliament
Nearly 70 per cent of people surveyed by the Nikkei business daily said Prime Minister Naoto Kan should be replaced, and a similar number said the government's response to the crisis was not acceptable.
Kan was criticised again in parliament on Monday for his response to the nuclear disaster, with an opposition lawmaker suggesting he had been ill-prepared from the start, pointing to Kan's admission that he could not recall the details of a drill last year that simulated a Fukushima-type incident.
"Prime Minister Kan is working hard, and he must be experiencing difficulties. But many people have questions about Prime Minister Kan's leadership. Perhaps the premier himself thinks he has leadership, but unfortunately ... 70 to 80 per cent (of respondents to public opinion polls) say [he] lacks leadership," opposition Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) lawmaker Masashi Waki told the upper house budget committee.
Kan has been derided for what many see as failure to lead. "Japan has experienced many crises in the past, but I believe this is the biggest crisis in the 65 years since the end of the Second World War," he told a parliamentary panel on Monday.
Punished in poll
"From now on ... we must persist with our strategy on two fronts, and I want to make every effort on both issues [recovery and the nuclear crisis]."
Kan's Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) was punished in local elections last weekend, losing nearly 70 seats.
More than half of the people surveyed by the Nikkei newspaper want the DPJ to team up with the LDP, and another poll in the Mainichi newspaper showed a similar result.
Kan has already invited the LDP to form a national unity government, but the LDP has rejected the idea of a coalition.
