Japan’s increasingly fraught 40-year wait for an heir to the chrysanthemum throne ended on Wednesday morning when Princess Kiko, the wife of the second in line, gave birth to a boy by caesarean section at a private Tokyo hospital.
The 39-year-old princess was taken into the operating theatre shortly before 8am local time to undergo the procedure, which had been planned for weeks after her doctors spotted a minor complication.
The nation exulted in news of the birth, which at once ended a growing crisis over succession in one of the world’s oldest monarchies.
The boy, whose name wasn’t immediately announced, becomes the third in line to the chrysanthemum throne after his uncle, Crown Prince Naruhito, and his father, Prince Akishino.
Kiko and Akishino have two daughters aged 14 and 11. The baby, weighing 2,49kg, was born at 8.27am and early reports said both mother and baby were doing well. The child’s father called Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko, who were on a visit to Hokkaido, to tell them the good news.
The baby is the first male to be born into the imperial family since Akishino, in 1965. The dearth of male heirs in a royal lineage that some claim stretches back 2 600 years had taken Japan to the brink of a constitutional crisis: under the 1947 succession law, only males descended from an emperor can inherit the throne.
Newspapers rolled out special editions while broadcasters marked the event with breathless coverage live from outside the hospital while the rest of the nation celebrated the appearance of a male heir.
Crown Prince Naruhito, the current heir, and his wife, Princess Masako, were under the spotlight for four years in the hope that they would produce a male heir following their marriage in 1993. Instead, they produced a daughter, the now four-year-old Princess Aiko.
Masako, a former diplomat who has struggled to adapt to life in one of the world’s most conservative monarchies, has been battling depression since late 2003 and is considered unlikely to have another child. The Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi, was preparing to submit a reform Bill this year that would have made Aiko eligible to ascend the throne, but put his plans on hold after news emerged of Kiko’s pregnancy.
The impending birth had attracted blanket media coverage. In Counting Down the Seconds, Asahi TV took viewers through the finer points of a caesarean section and explained the contents of the ancient rites that will follow the birth, including the presentation of a sword by the baby’s grandfather, Akihito.
Academics, meanwhile, speculated over which combination of Chinese kanji characters Akishino would select for the baby’s name. Most believed the child would be given a simple name, regardless of its sex, in keeping with those given to their daughters, Kako and Mako.
”He probably won’t choose anything complicated, or that would be difficult for the public to feel familiar with,” Yasuo Ohara, a classics professor at Kokugakuin University in Tokyo, told Reuters.
Many predicted the birth would spark a mini baby boom in Japan, which has seen its birthrate drop to a record low in the past year. The stock market had already responded to baby fever. Manufacturers of baby goods have seen their shares jump in recent days, with those in Combi, which specialises in strollers, hitting an all-time high on the Tokyo stock exchange on Monday. – Guardian Unlimited Â