Goshi Hosono, policy board chairman of the No. 1 opposition Democratic Party of Japan, was conspicuously absent from a Diet committee session on May 20, in which Katsuya Okada, head of the party, engaged in a one-on-one debate with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Although Hosono said he could not attend the meeting because he had to deliver a speech at Chuo University, behind his absence was an intra-party power struggle.
Prior to the debate, he and Yukio Edano, DPJ secretary-general, had a heated argument over legislative bills submitted by the Abe administration that would drastically change Japan¡¯s postwar security policies.
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