Lawmaker approve veteran as Bank of Japan deputy

http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Tokyo-Bank-of-Japan-new-deputy-governor-Hirohide-Yamaguchi-Yamaguchi/photo//081021/481/f0dad1c9829c442cb0d552f7e75fea60//s:/ap/20081024/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_central_bank_1;_ylt=AmXJv5Wn_w_Mz9f9sPb40ulv24cA


Bank of Japan's new deputy governor Hirohide Yamaguchi arrives for Diet confirmation in Tokyo Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2008. The legislature hears from Yamaguchi as worries grow about a global recession.
(AP Photo/Itsuo Inouye)

By YURI KAGEYAMA, AP Business Writer Yuri Kageyama, Ap Business Writer – Fri Oct 24, 2:58 am ET AP – Bank of Japan's new deputy governor Hirohide Yamaguchi arrives for Diet confirmation in Tokyo Tuesday, … TOKYO – A veteran bank official won approval as deputy governor of the Bank of Japan from both houses of parliament Friday as the ruling party and opposition put aside flaring contentions to maintain financial stability.

Hirohide Yamaguchi, an expert in interest rate policy, is filling a seat left empty for half a year. The opposition has wrangled repeatedly with the ruling Liberal Democrats over central bank appointments. But with Tokyo stock markets gyrating by the day and fears growing that U.S. economic woes will hurt Japan's export-dependent economy., the opposition opted this time around to cooperate with the government nomination.

Yamaguchi, 57, has promised to use his experience to steer monetary policy at the world's second biggest economy through looming financial uncertainties.

"Japan's financial system is relatively stable compared to the U.S., but there is escalating stress," he told lawmakers earlier this week. "Equity and currency markets are nervous. And the economy, suffering a slowdown in exports, is sluggish and will be sluggish for the time being."



The more powerful lower house of parliament, where the ruling coalition controls a two-thirds majority, approved Yamaguchi's appointment in a vote shown live on a Web broadcast. Earlier in the day, the opposition-controlled upper house supported it in a 226-7 vote, a parliamentary official said.

Yamaguchi will become deputy governor to Masaaki Shirakawa, who took office in April only after weeks of political jockeying.

The appointment now fills all the vacancies on the BOJ's nine-member policy board.

The Bank of Japan, whose key interest rate is already at a low 0.5 percent, sat out the coordinated interest rate cut by North American and European financial authorities earlier this month.

The Bank of Japan has flooded the money market with cash to keep liquidity and help stabilize the financial system since the September collapse of U.S. investment bank Lehman Brothers.