Campaign Policies: Political Reform

Campaign for general election of the House of Representatives started on October 15th. What kind of policies are the parties advocating? I am looking into them for three days. The first is on political reform. 

The general election 2024 is mainly about whether voters approve the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, which revealed its inappropriate managing of political funds in some factions. It found 85 lawmakers or designated candidates for next election. Some of them left the party, and others declined to run for next election. But 45 out of 85 still sought to run for the election.

 

The LDP dropped 11 members from its slate. While it approved other 34 as official candidates in single-seat constituencies, the party newly led by Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba removed them from the list of proportional representatives, which would be working for resurrection of losers in single-seat constituency. The opposition parties accused the LDP of fielding as much as 34 members who had been involved in the scandal.

 

LDP’s coalition partner, Komeito, decided to issue “recommendation” to some LDP candidates who had been dropped from the slate. The opposition parties criticized Komeito of supporting the candidates being abandoned even by the LDP.

 

Stances on the policy activities fund, a fund which is distributed from party leaders to members without disclosing purpose of spending, were clearly divided between parties. The opposition parties, plus Komeito, propose abolishment of the fund. The LDP included the abolishment as “an issue considered in the future.” Although some candidates in LDP presidential election upheld the abolition, Ishiba did not decide it.

 

The opposition parties are united for prohibiting donation from companies or organizations to the parties. Although their donation to each politician was prohibited in 1994, it has been possible for a company or organization to donate to political parties. Donation can also be made through buying ticket of fundraising parties. The LDP and Komeito has not referred to banning the donation of companies and organizations in their campaigns.

 

After the revision of Political Funds Control Act in 1994, the parties were allowed to receive fund from the government. The system was introduced for the politics to be independent from donations of private sectors interested in some policies. Nevertheless, a loophole remains in a way of donation not to politicians, but to parties.

 

In the poll of NHK in June, 50 percent responded that the donation should be prohibited, while 35 percent thought it did not have to be prohibited. Most people think that the investigation by the LDP was not sufficient. Although the opposition parties demand further investigation on the issue, Ishiba refused any reinvestigation on the lawmakers involved in the scandal.

 

Concerning large number of inherited lawmakers in the LDP, the CDP and Nippon Ishin-no Kai argue that there should be some regulation on succeeding candidacy in a family.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Amendment of Local Autonomy Law

The House of Representatives started discussion on revision of the Local Autonomy Law, which would vest the national government a power to instruct local government in an emergency. It may change the relationship between the national and local government, which has been recognized as equal. The opposition parties oppose the amendment, arguing that it would give the national government an excessive power.   With the Meiji Restoration, the national government abolished the feudal system, introducing modern governance. However, its autonomy was not sufficient. The governor of each prefecture was appointed by the national government. The local governments subordinated to the national government. It was as late as 2000 when  the Comprehensive Decentralization Law  was enacted and the relationship between the national and local government was defined as equal.   The national government found inconvenience in the relationship between the national and local government, when COVID-19 was preval
Read more

Request for Final Nuclear Disposal Site

Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry requested Genkai Town, Saga, to accept “literature survey” for building a final disposal site for high-level radioactive waste. Genkai is going to answer within this month. If it accepts, it will be the third place to accept that survey, following two places in Hokkaido. Main reason to accept the survey is supposed to be subsidy from the national government.   Japan has no final disposal site. Among all 54 reactors in 17 nuclear power generation plant, 12 reactors of 6 plants are operating. The rest of them are not in operation, some of which are determined to be decommissioned. Used nuclear fuels are stocked in each plant, 　 or have sent to a reprocessing plant in Rokkasho, Aomori. There are two plans to stock nuclear wastes in the intermediate facility for disposal, one is already built and another is still in negotiation.   Nuclear Fuel Final Disposal Act in 2000 determines to bury nuclear waste in the underground. Literature survey, which is
Read more

Death Penalty Demanded on Criminal of Arson

On the historically brutal case of arson, the public prosecutors demanded an ultimate penalty to the offender. In the trial on the arson and murder in Kyoto Animation in 2019, the prosecutors requested death penalty on the defendant, Shinji Aoba. The lawyers of Aoba argued that the court should avoid sentencing death penalty. The judgement will be passed next January. Aoba was indicted as putting fire after pouring gasoline in the building of Kyoto Animation (Kyoani), a studio producing animation works, and killed 36 staffs and injured 32 on July 18 th , 2019. In the trial, Aoba argued that he could not tolerate Kyoani, because it had stolen his novel story in its works. Aoba later apologized to the victim’s families that he had done too much and regretted it.   In the closing argument in Kyoto Regional Court, the prosecutors demanded death penalty for Aoba, because the number of victims were extremely high in the history of criminal trials in Japan. “It is hard to describe about how t
Read more