Japan Gov’t to map out postal privatization plan in Aug.-Sept.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Sunday the government will formulate a basic policy on postal privatization during the August-September period.
The comment, made during a program on public TV broadcaster NHK, apparently indicates Koizumi’s plan to contain opposition from within his own ruling Liberal Democratic Party over the privatization issue by mapping out the basic policy at the same time as he reshuffles the Cabinet and appoints LDP executives, pundits said.
Koizumi said that after Japan’s postal services are privatized, the state’s full guarantees on postal savings and preferential treatment for corporations, including exemption of corporate taxes and fixed asset taxes, should be abolished in stages during a transitional period of up to 10 years.
Postal privatization is a key pillar of Koizumi’s structural reform program.
The nation’s three postal services — mail delivery, postal savings and “kampo” life insurance — are currently handled by the Japan Post, which took over the postal services from the governmental Postal Services Agency. The government plans to privatize the entity in stages starting in 2007.
