The office of former Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba holds photographs of five former premiers. Four of them shaped his career: Kakuei Tanaka brought him into politics, Noboru Takeshita was chief guest at his wedding reception, Ryutaro Hashimoto was party president when Ishiba was readmitted to the Liberal Democratic Party, and Junichiro Koizumi was prime minister when Ishiba first joined a cabinet as defense minister.
The fifth is Yasuo Fukuda, who died on Oct. 26 at 90. Compared with the others, Fukuda cut a low-key figure. Asked in 2021 what connected the two men, Ishiba went back to 2008.
In February that year a Maritime Self-Defense Force Aegis destroyer collided with a fishing boat off Chiba, and the boat's captain and his eldest son were killed. Ishiba was defense minister and Fukuda was prime minister. Criticism of the accident and of the Defense Ministry's response mounted, and so did calls for Ishiba to resign immediately.
Ishiba recalled that Fukuda went to the bereaved family's home on his own some time after the accident. The family gave Fukuda a letter asking that Ishiba not step down, but work to prevent a repeat, Ishiba said.
“Fukuda trusted me too, and he kept me in the job.”Shigeru Ishiba, former prime minister
Contemporary coverage dates the visit to March 2, 2008. Fukuda left his security detail and secretaries outside and met the family alone, and reports at the time said his eyes filled with tears.
Ishiba said he visits the family every year. On one visit, he recalled, they pressed a large haul of seafood on him and told him to take it to Fukuda. He did, and the two men ate it together.
Both men have drawn the same kind of remarks in Nagatacho — that they are difficult, cold, short of friends. Ishiba's account describes something else.
A first visit, and a thank-you call
The Mainichi Shimbun reporter who wrote this piece first visited Fukuda's office in the spring of 2015, tagging along on an interview by Takakazu Matsuda, a veteran political reporter then serving as a special adviser to the paper. Fukuda was known for telling people "you're not like me," and the reporter expected him to be prickly.
Matsuda asked Fukuda about Asian diplomacy, and the exchange ran in the paper's evening edition. It touched on sensitive subjects including the Yasukuni Shrine, and the reporter braced for a complaint.
Instead, after sending Fukuda a copy of the paper with a note of thanks, the reporter got a phone call.
Fukuda, who served as prime minister for about a year and chaired the 2008 Toyako G8 summit, remained an advocate of Japan's pacifist constitution after leaving office. In a January interview he argued for the strength of what he called the peace constitution at a time of trial.