Japan’s Senate will have a record number of 35 women

July 11 (EUROPA PRESS) –

Japan’s upper house will have a record 35 female senators after elections held on Sunday, overshadowed by the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday.

Of a total of 125 seats that were at stake, 35 will now be occupied by women, according to information from the newspaper ‘The Japan Times’. In total, 181 women had stood for election, also the highest number in the country’s history.

In the two previous elections, less than thirty women were elected to occupy a seat in the Senate. The candidates have accounted for 33.2 percent of the candidates in the last elections, the highest percentage, despite the fact that they have not managed to reach the 35 percent target established by the Government for 2025.

Among those chosen are veteran Liberal Democratic Party politicians such as Satsuki Katayama, former Secretary of State for Regional Revitalization, and Kuniko Inoguchi, former Secretary of State in charge of Gender Equality and Social Affairs.

Junko Mihara, an actress by profession, has been re-elected for a third term for the Kanagawa district while Akiko Ikuina, a singer of a pop group, also won a seat.

Japanese journalist and senator Renho Murata, commonly known by her name Renho, has pointed out that this is a “good sign” and has recalled that “diversity is always discussed.” “We hope to achieve parity and increase the number of parliamentarians,” she asserted.

This Sunday, the bloc of Japanese parties in favor of reforming the Constitution to eliminate its pacifist character has achieved a clear victory in the partial elections to the Sangiin, with which they add the two thirds necessary to promote its modification.

The Liberal Democratic Party (PLD) of the Japanese Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida, has been the great winner of the elections after winning at least 63 of the 125 seats at stake, while his ally, the Komeito party, adds another 12 seats, according to official results.

These four parties have openly proposed changing Article 9, which specifies the country’s renunciation of war as a foreign policy tool and thus renounces the sovereign right to belligerence.

Therefore, it enshrines at the constitutional level the renunciation of military forces capable of war, so that the armed forces are limited to the Japan Self-Defense Forces, which do not have offensive weapons such as nuclear weapons or ballistic missiles.