Aso draws support in Japanese leadership race

By Chisa Fujioka

TOKYO (Reuters) - Outspoken former Japanese foreign minister Taro Aso is the top choice of voters and of around half of the ruling party's branches to replace Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda, who quit suddenly this week, media polls showed on Wednesday.

Aso, the frontrunner to take power, favors increased government spending to help avoid a looming recession although this worries some in the ruling party who fear his policies could stall efforts to cut Japan's sky-high public debt.

That, and worries over his history of gaffes, has fuelled speculation that others may also run in the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leadership race.

A survey published by Kyodo news agency on Wednesday found 35.3 percent of respondents favored Aso, 67, as the country's next LDP leader, making him the most popular candidate. Another poll over the weekend, before Fukuda quit, also had him as top choice.

Of 47 LDP party chapters, 23 said they would back Aso, the Asahi newspaper said, with supporters seeing him as the best candidate to lead the party to victory in an election due within a year. Most other branches were undecided.

The LDP's branches, along with its lawmakers, will vote for a new party leader on September 22 to replace the unpopular Fukuda, who resigned on Monday.

Aso, currently the LDP's second-ranking official, has yet to formally announce a bid for the leadership but the comic book fan and former Olympic sharpshooter has said he is a suitable candidate to carry on Fukuda's policies.

It would be his fourth bid for the leadership, including a loss to Fukuda in a leadership election last year, despite being the initial favorite then too.

"There is no mood to welcome 'party leader Aso' with open arms," the conservative Sankei newspaper said.

A potential contender is Yuriko Koike, who was briefly last year the country's first female defense minister and is backed by a former LDP secretary-general who favors fiscal reforms.

"I have been contacting people," she told reporters. "You can't play baseball alone."

Aso has said Japan could put off its goal of balancing the budget within the next few years, despite public debt of around 1-½ times GDP, the highest among big industrialized countries.

In foreign policy, he has offended Japan's Asian neighbors in the past, including the two Koreas with a comment in 2003 that was seen as praising Japan's 1910-1945 colonization of the peninsula.

The new LDP leader elected this month is assured the Japanese premiership by virtue of the party's grip on parliament, which is expected to convene shortly after the LDP presidential race to elect a successor to Fukuda.

The LDP, along with its junior coalition partner the New Komeito party, is seeking to rebuild support ahead of a lower house election that the Sankei said could take place as early as October 26.