For the first time in 15 years the Liberal Democratic Party has lost its majority in the Tokyo parliament. The new prime minister has paid for the scandals of undeclared funds that the party received and had already caused Kishida’s popularity to collapse. Barring an expansion of the coalition, the opposition led by Yoshihiko Noda is trying to form a common front with the centrists. For the first time, the Conservative Party, a xenophobic and revisionist force, will enter Parliament.
Tokyo (/Agencies) – For the first time in 15 years, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) will not achieve a majority of seats in the House of Representatives of the Tokyo parliament, not even together with its allied party Komeito. But despite this tough defeat, Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba today declared his intention to remain prime minister of Japan, heading a minority government. “We cannot afford a political stalemate,” Ishiba explained at a press conference at the LDP headquarters. He ruled out the possibility of an expansion of the current coalition and expressed his intention to “adopt what needs to be adopted” from the policies of the opposition parties that have gained momentum, while promoting a cooperative relationship with them.
The numbers that came out of the polls are merciless for Ishiba, who had played the card of early elections after having replaced the resigning Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on October 1, devastated by the crisis of consensus due to scandals over violations of the financing rules of numerous PLD deputies and the economic crisis that the country has been going through for some time. The seats of the coalition currently leading Japan fell sharply from 288 to 215 (191 for the LDP and 24 for Komeito), that is, 18 less than the threshold of 233 seats needed to obtain a majority. The main opposition party, the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, a leftist force currently led by Yoshihiko Noda (who was prime minister for a year in 2012), regained many seats, going from 98 to 148. But the vote has also awarded to the Democratic Party for the People (DPFP), a centrist force whose elected parliamentarians went from 7 to 28. It would be the formation politically closest to the current government coalition, but its entire leadership – hotly – declared that it was not willing to support to the Ishiba government.
For his part, furthermore, Noda has already called a meeting for tomorrow with representatives of the DPFP and Ishin (another centrist force that obtained 38 seats) with the purpose of forming a common front of the oppositions. This bloc would also not have a majority in parliament, but could still have only one seat less than the coalition led by the PLD, even if the distances between the political forces in question are, in reality, marked. Finally, it should be noted that for the first time the Conservative Party of Japan, an openly xenophobic ultranationalist force prone to revisionist rhetoric about the country’s history, will enter the Japanese parliament with 3 seats. Entry into Parliament will offer him the prerogatives of the national parties, which until now he had not been able to access.
Ishiba described the electoral result as “harsh” and promised to radically reform his party to regain the trust of voters, shaken by the black fund scandal. He called for unity from the LDP: “We have failed to address people’s suspicions, mistrust and anger over the lack of declaration of political funds and the issue of money in politics,” admitted Ishiba.
In the uncertain political phase now opening in Tokyo, the law establishes that a special parliamentary session will be convened to elect the next prime minister within 30 days following the elections in the Lower House. According to sources close to Ishiba cited by the agency Kyodothe Government intends to set this date for November 11.
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