Morihiro Hosokawa - Early Life

Early Life

Hosokawa Morihiro was born in Tokyo as the eldest son of Marquis Morisada Hosokawa, the head of the Hosokawa clan. He is the grandson of former Japanese Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe. Owing to his birth, he was born a marquis, but lost the title in 1947 at the age of nine when the kazoku, or peerage was abolished by the American occupation government.

He received his LL.B. from Sophia University in 1961. After working for the newspaper the Asahi Shimbun as journalist for several years, he was elected to the House of Councillors of Japan as a member of the LDP in 1971, representing Kumamoto Prefecture.

After serving two terms in the National Diet, he left in 1983 to become the governor of Kumamoto, where he served until 1991.

In 1992, he announced that he could no longer stand the corruption in the LDP and left in order to found the reformist Japan New Party (JNP).

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