So when he talked with The Wall Street Journal on Friday after a meeting of the Group of 20 industrial and developing nations, he offered frank opinions about many subjects, including one of his distant relatives, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Mr. Aso acknowledged that he wants to be as bullish about the Japanese economy as Haruhiko Kuroda, new governor of the Bank of Japan, who says the country will achieve a 2% inflation target in two years. But Mr. Aso isn’t so sure about the prospect of inflation because he has one nagging concern.
It isn’t the sovereign debt crisis in Europe, not a fiscal cliff in America, not a possible flare-up of tensions with China, but Prime Minister Abe’s penchant for national security and patriotic education.
Mr. Aso said he is “not so confident” that Mr. Abe will stay focused on economic reform after an upper-house election in July. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party is widely expected to win a landslide in the election, giving Mr. Abe control over both chambers of parliament and boosting his chances of making constitutional amendments.
Mr. Abe’s desire is to review the Self-Defense Forces’ current status as a non-military organization and to redefine them as a military for national defense. Japan’s pacifist constitution, drafted by the occupying forces after World War II, prohibits the country from maintaining military forces.
“In the past three years while we were in the opposition, we found out what the general public was really looking for. It was not education or constitution, but the economy,” Mr. Aso said. “We have persuaded Mr. Abe to set aside his pet interests and focus on the economy first, and he’s doing just that.”
But “there’s concern that once we get a victory in the upper-house election, Mr. Abe might go in a different direction,” Mr. Aso said.
The 72-year-old Mr. Aso added that “it’s probably my job to tell him that he will have to concentrate on the economy for another few years.”