Japan's parliament to vote on BOJ nominees next week

TOKYO, March 2 (Reuters) - Japan's lower house of parliament is set to vote on the government's nominees for new central bank governor and its two deputies at its plenary session on March 9, a senior ruling party lawmaker said on Thursday. Last month the government nominated Kazuo Ueda, an academic and a former Bank of Japan (BOJ) policy board member, as new central bank governor. It also named former financial watchdog head Ryozo Himino, and BOJ executive Shinichi Uchida, as the two deputy governors. Unlike incumbent Governor Haruhiko Kuroda, who arrived with a clear mandate to beat deflation with massive stimulus, Ueda faces the delicate task of phasing out his predecessor's radical and complicated policy framework without derailing a fragile economic recovery. The nominations need approval of both of parliament's
houses to take effect, which is almost a done deal given the ruling coalition's solid majority in the both chambers. Incumbent chief Haruhiko Kuroda's term ends on April 8 and the two deputies' terms end on March 19. The lower house vote will be followed by one in the upper house on March 10, parliament sources told Reuters on Thursday. "This will be approved. We will formally decide on the voting schedule at executives' meeting on March 7" at the lower
chamber's steering committee, its chief Shunichi Yamaguchi told reporters. At their confirmation hearings held at parliament last month, the nominees suggested it was appropriate and necessary to continue current easing policy for the time being to achieve sustainable and stable inflation with wage growth.

(Reporting by Yoshifumi Takemoto and Tetsushi Kajimoto; Editing by Kim Coghill)