Seiichi Ōta

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Seiichi Ōta ( Japanese 太 田 誠 一 , Ōta Seiichi ; born October 30, 1945 in Fukuoka ) is a former Japanese politician of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). Until 2009 he was a member of the Shūgiin , the lower house, and from August to September 2008 he was Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in the Cabinet . Within the LDP he belonged to the Koga faction .

Life

After attending the Keio high school, he studied at the economics faculty of the Keio University . After graduating in 1968, he initially continued his studies there. In 1973 he became a lecturer at Fukuoka University , and a year later he was a visiting professor at Brown University in Providence , Rhode Island.

Then Ōta switched to politics: After a failed attempt in 1979, he was elected to the Shūgiin for the LDP in 1980, where he was then a member of the judiciary and budget committees. In 1988 he became Parliamentary State Secretary (" seimujikan ") in the Ministry of Finance . In 1994 Ōta left the LDP and took part in the founding of the short-lived Liberal Party , which in December became the Shinshintō of Ichirō Ozawa . He left in 1995 and returned to the LDP a few months later. From 1998 to 1999 he was the first minister under Prime Minister Keizō Obuchi as head of the authority for management and coordination .

In 2003, at a symposium on the problem of the falling birth rate, he made the following statement relating to a previous group rape case: “Group rapists are still vital and that is good. Isn't that closer to normal? ”(「集 団 レ イ プ す る 人 は 、 ま だ 元 気 が あ る か ら い い い。 ま だ 正常 に 近 い ん じ ゃ な い か , Shūdan re chikain janai ka ) and came under heavy public pressure. Shortly afterwards, Ōta lost his constituency Fukuoka  7, which also includes parts of the city of Fukuoka, to the democratic challenger Kazue Fujita in the 2003 Shūgiin election . In 2005 he was able to win him back with a clear lead of over 30,000 votes and thus moved into the Shūgiin for the eighth time. In 2006 he became "executive chairman" ( kaichō daikō ) of the Koga faction. During the cabinet reshuffle in August 2008 , Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda appointed him Minister of Agriculture.

In August 2008, irregularities in the campaign funding of one of Ōta's offices were discovered. In 2007, his predecessors in the Ministry of Agriculture Matsuoka , Akagi and Endo resigned or ended their lives over similar allegations.

On September 19, 2008, Ōta and State Secretary ( jimujikan ) Toshirō Shirasu submitted his resignation to take responsibility for a scandal over the sale and processing of rice not intended for human consumption . Imported rice from China, Vietnam and the United States contaminated with the pesticide methamidophos and destined for industrial use had entered the trade. The scandal followed a number of similar cases of contaminated imported food, mostly from the People's Republic of China.

In the 2009 general election , he lost his constituency to the Democrat Kazue Fujita  and announced his retirement from politics in February 2011.

family

Grandfather Sakurachi Yukio

Ōta's father-in-law Kamei Hikaru was governor of Fukuoka Prefecture from 1967 to 1983, and his cousin Kiyoko is the wife of Yasuo Fukuda. His paternal grandfather Ōta Seizō IV was a member of the lower house for the Rikken Seiyūkai and later a member of the manor house; his maternal grandfather Sakurauchi Yukio was also a member of the House of Commons and, inter alia, Minister of Industry and Trade in the Wakatsuki second cabinet .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Fury over Japan rape gaffe. In: BBC News. June 27, 2003, accessed August 17, 2011 .
  2. ↑ 「集 団 レ イ プ 元 気 が あ る」 女子 大 生 暴行 事件 で 太 田氏 . In: 47 News / Kyōdō Tsūshin . March 26, 2003, Retrieved August 18, 2011 (Japanese).
  3. ↑ Fukui quizzed on office expenses . The Japan Times, August 29, 2008
  4. ^ Japan minister quits in rice row. In: BBC News. September 19, 2008, accessed September 19, 2008 .
  5. ^ Japan agriculture minister quits over tainted rice . The associated Press, September 19, 2008
  6. ↑ 太 田 誠 一 ・ 元 農 相 、 政界 引退 を 表明 福岡 市 で の 会合 で . In: Yomiuri Shimbun . February 2, 2011, accessed January 12, 2018 (Japanese).
  7. ↑ Sakurauchi-Fukuda-Ōta family tree
personal data
SURNAME Ōta, Seiichi
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 太 田 誠 一 (Japanese)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Japanese politician
DATE OF BIRTH October 30, 1945
PLACE OF BIRTH Fukuoka , Fukuoka Prefecture , Japan