Japan's Aso is ready and waiting as PM's woes grow

By Linda Sieg

TOKYO (Reuters) - Ready, willing and waiting. That's prime ministerial wannabe Taro Aso's message to the Japanese public as incumbent Yasuo Fukuda's woes deepen and his popularity sags.

Appearing this week on popular TV show "SMAPxSMAP", where pop idols cook for celebrity guests, the outspoken former foreign minister confirmed one of politics' worst-kept secrets -- he longs for the nation's top job.

"There are things I want to do that are impossible unless I am prime minister," Aso, 67, said on the program, where he cracked jokes and sampled a menu that included hamburger smothered in cheese.

Aso never referred to Fukuda's headaches, but the 71-year-old Japanese leader has lots of them.

A Japanese warship collided with a fishing boat on Tuesday, leaving two men missing and prompting opposition calls for the defense minister to resign amid charges of slack crisis management and conflicting reports about the accident's cause.

Fukuda's support rating has been falling since he took office last September on doubts about his leadership, fanned by a defense ministry bribery scandal, misplaced public pension records and a sense that he lacks policy vision and flair.

Fukuda is also struggling to enact laws because opposition parties control parliament's upper house and can delay bills, as well as block key appointments such as for a successor to Bank of Japan Governor Toshihiko Fukui, whose term expires on March 19.

The slide in Fukuda's support rating, down about nine points from a month ago to 38.7 percent in a media survey published on Tuesday, before the maritime accident, has stirred speculation that his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) will seek to replace him ahead of a general election that could come this year.

"You look at the current pace (of decline) and wonder if it is just a question of time," said Sophia University political science professor Koichi Nakano.

"It is quite possible that the administration runs completely out of steam before the (July Group of Eight) summit."

NOT THAT EASY

No election for parliament's lower house need be held until September 2009. Fukuda has hinted he wants to wait at least until after Japan hosts the G8 leaders' gathering, but the main opposition Democratic Party is pushing for an earlier poll.

No one doubts that Aso, known for his occasional gaffes and a fondness for "manga" comics as well as a nationalist tinge to his views on diplomacy, has his eye on the nation's top job.

He came in a respectable second in the race against Fukuda to succeed Shinzo Abe, who abruptly quit last September after a year plagued by missteps and scandals among his cabinet ministers.

Forcing a prime minister out of office isn't easy without an election loss, although a precedent exists in the case of Yoshiro Mori, who was replaced by the charismatic Junichiro Koizumi after his support rates crashed below 10 percent in 2001.

"Some will say they can't fight an election under Fukuda," said Yasunori Sone, a Keio University political science professor. "Fukuda's support is down and Aso is popular -- that's true ... But Fukuda would have to quit, and he wants to stay."

Should Fukuda stumble, though, analysts say Aso at present looks best placed to step in.

The scion of a political family and known for his ability to work a crowd, the colorful Aso would be a stark contrast to Fukuda, a bland if sometimes testy moderate known for dovish diplomatic policies that stress good ties with Asian neighbors.

Aso, like Abe before him, wants to see Japan stride more boldly on the world stage and revive traditional values at home.

"Japan's reputation in the world has risen. But are we aware of that and responding to it? I think such awareness is completely lacking," he said on the TV program this week.

But Aso also has a reputation for making remarks that offend.

He stirred anger in the two Koreas in 2003 for comments seen as praising Japan's 1919-1945 colonization of the peninsula, and some in Korea also want him to atone for the use of Korean forced laborers at a firm run by his family during World War Two.

(Editing by Alex Richardson)