Makiko Tanaka

Makiko Tanaka with US Navy divers

Makiko Tanaka ( Japanese 田中 真 紀 子 , Tanaka Makiko ; born January 14, 1944 in Tokyo ) is a Japanese politician of the Democratic Party (DPJ). From 1993 to 2012 she was a member of the Shūgiin , the lower house of the national parliament, from Niigata and Science (1994–1995), Foreign (2001–2002) and Education and Science Minister (2012).

Life

Tanaka is the daughter of former Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka . She was elected to Shūgiin for the first time in 1993 in her father's earlier constituency (3rd constituency Niigata , 5 seats) for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). She was first minister in the Murayama cabinet in 1994 as head of the Science and Technology Department . After the electoral reform, she ran successfully in the one-mandate constituency Niigata 5 from 1996 .

From 2001 to 2002 Tanaka was Foreign Minister under Prime Minister Junichirō Koizumi , but due to differences with the former official State Secretary ( jimujikan , English Administrative Vice-Minister ) for Foreign Affairs, Yoshiji Nogami , about the participation of NGOs in the international conference on support for the reconstruction of Afghanistan . This incident resulted in a decline in support for Koizumi. According to a survey, 78 percent of the population criticized Koizumi for the dismissal. Tanaka was very popular among young Japanese voters, especially female voters.

Shortly after her dismissal as a minister, she was initially suspended by the LDP ethics committee in June 2002 after a scandal about improperly rededicated secretary salaries paid by the state and resigned from her parliamentary mandate in August 2002. She ran as an independent in 2003 , was able to win back her constituency and then joined the parliamentary group of the Democratic Party. She joined the Democratic Party prior to the 2009 Shūgiin election and won her constituency for the fifth time since its establishment in 1996. She has since chaired the Shūgiin Committee on Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.

In the third cabinet reshuffle of Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda on October 1, 2012, she became Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology . In December 2012, she lost her constituency clearly to Tadayoshi Nagashima (LDP) in the 2012 Shūgiin election and also missed re-election in the proportional representation bloc.

Her husband is Sangiin MP and former Defense Minister Naoki Tanaka (formerly LDP, now DPJ).

Web links

Commons : Makiko Tanaka  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Official website (Japanese)
• Brief CV at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Misappropriation probe sought. Both camps pursue Tanaka over salaries. In: The Japan Times . April 8, 2002, accessed October 2, 2009 . 
2. ↑ Former Foreign Minister Tanaka tenders Diet resignation. Questions remain over role in salary scandal. In: The Japan Times . August 10, 2002, accessed October 2, 2009 . 
3. ↑ Tanaka bombshell leaves LDP in by-election crisis. In: The Japan Times . August 11, 2002, accessed October 1, 2009 . 
4. ^ Tanaka gets a stage in Diet as DPJ ally. In: The Japan Times . November 19, 2003, accessed October 1, 2009 .