First Woman Governor to Lead Tokyo

Yuriko Koike, Japan's first defense minister, outpaced her notorious foes in the Tokyo gubernatorial election in a landslide victory to be Tokyo's first woman governor in history.

Koike kicked off her campaign with a visibly poor public reception against her immediate foe, Hiroya Masuda, who was officially approved by the same Liberal Democratic Party in her favor, but she quickly built up momentum in the first week of campaign.

Koite had a self-generated tail wind as her powerful oratory kept on drawing public support town after town of her canvassing. She was aware that her own party, LDP, had mobilized its organized supporters behind Masuda and that she had only to collect floating votes.

That she did beautifully, as she chained every major station along the Japan Railway Chuo Lines with 30-minute campaign speeches, appealing at each station how she had "jumped off a cliff" without organized support as a Jeanne d'Arc. When slandered by a flippant elderly ”a matron well-advanced in age with heavy make-up", a witty Koite countered:

"So, they make me a Jeanne d'Arc. Jeanne d'Arc, yes, but I'm not as young. She was burned to death, remember? Burn me to death you may, I mind not at all, but only after I've done what I must as governor. "

Yuriko Koite, 64, has a brilliant career as the 8-term member of the House of Representatives. She navigated among the parties in power - from the Japan New Party, New Frontier Party, Liberal Party, Conservative Party and then the Liberal Democratic Party. Koike served as Minister of Environment in the Koizumi cabinet in 2003. In the first Abe administration in 2007, she was appointed Japan's first woman minister of defense.

As you probably infer from the way Koike has pulled an upset, the ruling LDP has grave inner conflicts in its leg in the metropolitan government assembly. Koike's sweeping victory this time should have a cleansing effect on the running of the assembly. (Nathan Shiga)