Outgoing Japanese leader urges ruling party to embrace change

By Tim Kelly and Rocky Swift

TOKYO (Reuters) - Outgoing Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Wednesday urged his colleagues to embrace change and seek out a candidate that will transform an unpopular incumbent party with bleak electoral prospects.

Kishida, 67, announced he would not stand for re-election as Liberal Democratic Party boss next month, amid one of the lowest public support rates ever recorded by the scandal-ridden party, which has ruled Japan for most of the past eight decades.

"It is necessary to show the people how the LDP has evolved and has been reborn," Kishida said at a press conference.

In an opinion poll released by public broadcaster NHK this month only a quarter of respondents said they backed his government against more than half who did not.

A general election must be held by the third quarter of 2025, giving the new party chief just over a year at most to revive the party's fortunes.

"The new leader needs to be a fresh face, whether that means young or not associated with Kishida, and reform-minded," said Rintaro Nishimura, an associate at Washington-based strategic advisory firm The Asia Group.

That effectively ruled out establishment candidates, such as party secretary-general Toshimitsu Motegi, he said.

Motegi, 68, an LDP insider who had led the foreign and trade ministries, has yet to say whether he will run. Among Kishida's potential replacements, he most closely aligns with the type of candidate the faction-riven LDP has historically coalesced around in the past.

However, recent opinion polls suggest he is not the public's choice.

Polls published by local media over the past several weeks showed former defence minister Shigeru Ishiba, 67, was the most popular candidate to succeed Kishida. A rare voice of dissent within the ruling party, Ishiba has run and lost in four LDP leadership contests. However, in a voter poll released by Kyodo News last month he was backed by 28.4% of respondents, while only 2.5% percent picked Motegi.

In second place at 12.7% was Shinjiro Koizumi, a former environment minister and the son of former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi, who at 43, would represent a rare generational shift in leadership if picked by the LDP.

"It's a time for transition of power between generations," Tokyo resident Nobuo Koide, 82, told Reuters, calling Kishida's move "a great decision."

However, the retiree, like most members of the public, will not have a say in selecting Japan’s next prime minister.

In the first round of LDP voting next month, when votes will be evenly split between lawmakers and rank-and-file members, the field of candidates will narrow to two if no one secures a majority.

In the second round, lawmakers will hold most of the votes, giving an advantage to the candidate who has the backing of party heavyweights.

(Reporting by Tim Kelly, Rocky Swift, Akiko Okamoto and Kiyoshi Takenaka; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Tomasz Janowski)