Fukuda should think about clear road ahead

A road that runs straight through green grassland stretches as far as the horizon and disappears beyond a hill. The scene depicted in "Michi" (Road), one of the best-known works of Japanese painter Kaii Higashiyama (1908-1999), continues to make an impression on many people.

I saw the 1950 painting at an exhibition currently being held in Tokyo to commemorate the 100th anniversary of his birth. The painting was executed with simple brushstrokes, which makes it all the more dynamic. When he created the artwork, Higashiyama said he was expressing his "mental state of feeling nostalgia for the past while making an effort to step out into the future" in the white, shining road.

Fast-forward to the present. The ruling coalition is apparently unable to part with "nostalgia for the past" over roads. In a second round of voting Tuesday, the coalition-led Lower House approved a bill to revise a special law to limit the use of revenues from gasoline and other taxes to road construction for 10 more years.

Prior to the vote, the Cabinet of Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda approved a policy to lift such constraints to allow the use of road-specific taxes for general purposes starting fiscal 2009. While saying the funds would also be used for such purposes as education and welfare, the coalition passed contradictory legislation in the Diet. This bizarre state of affairs reminds me of a god of shepherds and flocks from Western mythology, whose upper body is human but who has the hindquarters of a goat.

For the past four months, the ruling and oppositions parties have been squabbling over the road tax issue. Fukuda promised that he would make road-specific taxes available for general purposes. That is probably about the only fruit of the argument.

Although the promise was somewhat weak and spineless at first, it became firm after the Cabinet decision. At the same time, however, the "special law" gave lawmakers representing the interests of the road construction industry a spear to attack it. Quite a few people worry that if the lawmakers go on the offensive, it will be difficult to prevent their attack.

Higashiyama's "Road" is perhaps more of a mental image than actual scenery. I want to believe that there is also a straight road in the prime minister's mind. Attempts to free up road-specific taxes for general purposes have been made repeatedly in the past, always to be thwarted. At any rate, it is unacceptable to wander off and go back to the old road.

--The Asahi Shimbun, May 14(IHT/Asahi: May 15,2008)