A Cabinet shuffle is in the works as Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda makes adjustments ahead of an .anticipated lower house election later this year.

Noda, who’s been reelected president of the Democratic Party of Japan, has met with the DPJ Secretary-General, Azuma Koshiishi twice, asking him to stay on and help pick a new Cabinet team.  “I would like to beef up our team so we can shift the DPJ once again to make it a fighting force that can serve Japan,” says Noda.

He’s now in New York to attend the United Nations General Assembly.  “I think there are areas where we can strengthen the cabinet function,” says Noda, and “I can best do that by putting the right people into the right posts.”  Reports circulating suggest that Seiji Maehara, the Policy Research Committee Chairman, and Acting Secretary-General Shinji Tarutoko are probably facing the axe.

Noda, the country’s sixth prime minister in as many years, has the power to dissolve the powerful lower house and call new elections any time before the Diet’s four-year term ends next year.

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