Koizumi Takes on the Bureaucrats

[Mulboyne]

Kyodo via Yahoo: Koizumi appointment causes stir in Kasumigaseki
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's abrupt dismissal of two Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry executives who had been uncooperative with his pet project of postal privatization is creating a stir in Kasumigaseki, the bureaucratic center of Tokyo. It is unusual for a prime minister to intervene in personnel affairs at governmental ministries and agencies...Koizumi told Internal Affairs and Communications Minister Taro Aso to remove the two officials from the job of postal administration..."Why didn't you risk you life and oppose the personnel reshuffle?" former LDP Secretary General Hiromu Nonaka asked Aso at a gathering of postmasters in Osaka...The meeting attracted about 9,000 postmasters from across the country, and Nonaka's remark drew applause from them...more...