国际英语新闻：Party unity, economic recovery remains biggest battle for reelected Japanese PM

TOKYO, Sept. 14 (Xinhua) -- Japan's Prime Minister Naoto Kan staved off challenge from powerbroker Ichiro Ozawa for the ruling Democratic Party of Japan's (DPJ) top post on Tuesday.

DPJ members of parliament, local DPJ lawmakers and party members chose 63-year-old Kan over his 68-year-old veteran opponent in a leadership election which saw Kan win by a wider- than-expected margin of 721-491 points.

Kan now faces the task of reshuffling cabinet, restoring economy as the yen rose to a 15-year high against the U.S. dollar and determining the role Ozawa will play in the party.

UNITED WE STAND, DIVIDED WE FALL

Ozawa has been a vocal critic of Kan's leadership throughout his three-month tenure. Kan's failure to retain a majority in the upper house election in July, following what many pundits believe were premature comments to the public about a possible consumption tax hike, irked Ozawa to the point that against many DPJ heavyweights advise, he decided to once and for all challenge Kan for the leadership.

The rift this spat has caused in the ruling party, in which Ozawa controls the largest faction, threatens to further derail party unity.

Ozawa himself was instrumental in fostering the DPJ and was the brains behind the August 2009 lower house election, which saw the DPJ sweep to power in a monumental landslide, breaking almost half- century of unbroken rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).

"Kan has little choice but to reshuffle his cabinet and in doing so he'd give some fairly prominent positions to some of Ozawa's backers as well as Ozawa himself," Dr. David McLellan, a professor of Asian Studies at Waseda Univesity, told Xinhua.

"In a sense, Ozawa is the glue in the party bond and although it's highly unlikely that Ozawa will leave the ruling party anytime soon, Kan must pay attention to the overwhelming influence Ozawa can and will assert," McLellan said.

Other analysts also believe Ozawa, dubbed as "the shadow shogun, " will not settle into being a rank-and-file DPJ member.

Born into politics, Ozawa's father was a politician and it is widely noted that some of Ozawa's earliest mentors, after the rising star left his northern rice-growing town in Iwate, were themselves former prime ministers, including Kakuei Tanaka, known as Japan's original "shadow shogun".

"We've almost certainly not heard the last of "the shadow shogun," independent political analyst Teruhisa Muramatsu told Xinhua.

"With his second-generation blue-blood political pedigree and the fact that although his history is tainted with political funds scandal, we must agree, love him or hate him, he is a political genius," he said, adding "Ozawa's not finished yet."

"Kan's challenge now is establish a truly unified party system where members feel their concerns are listened to," said Jun Iio, a political science professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo.