Opposition Parties Seek Unified Action

Given an unusual opportunity to grab a leading power by Komeito’s leave from the leading coalition, the opposition parties began to consider a possibility of unified action to elect next prime minister in the Diet. Without Komeito, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has further distance from a majority in both chambers. The opposition leaders agreed on having a meeting to discuss how they would vote in the election of prime minister. 

In a discussion of Fuji Television on October 12th, the leader of Constitutional Democratic Party (CDPJ), Yoshihiko Noda, told that the head of Democratic Party for the People (DPP), Yuichiro Tamaki, would be a viable choice for the prime minister. Tamaki had been a target of the Constitutional Democratic Party before Komeito left the leading coalition on October 10th. CDPJ Secretary General, Jun Azumi, told DPP Secretary General, Katsuya Shinba, on October 8th that Tamaki could be a candidate of prime minister for the opposition parties unitedly vote for.

 

Tamaki has showed his willingness to be a prime minister, saying that he was ready for the premiership. However, he insisted that agreement on some basic policies, such as constitutional amendment, security policy or nuclear power generation. Tamaki required the CDPJ to reconsider its policy negative on active execution of defense policies. On the other hand, Tamaki tried to keep a connection with the LDP which had been seeking coalition with the DPP.

 

Asking Tamaki for some tolerance in policy, Noda proposed leaders meeting with Tamaki and the co-leader of Japan Innovation Party (Nippon Ishin-no Kai), Fumitake Fujita. Tamaki and Fujita accepted Noda’s offer and they are going to have a leaders’ meeting on October 15th. It is highly unusual for those three parties to have a summit meeting for discussing cooperation for building a coalition.

 

The secretary generals of those three parties had a meeting the day before the leaders’ meeting. In the meeting on October 14th, the DPP demanded the CDPJ to rethink its policy stance that security legislation in 2015 was partly unconstitutional and nuclear power generation was not necessary. Ishin is watching how the negotiation between the CDPJ and DPP would go.

 

Those three parties have 210 seats in the House of Representatives, which has a power to name a prime minister. The LDP has 196. If Komeito, with 24 seats, does not vote for LDP candidate, it is likely that a candidate backed by three opposition parties can become a prime minister in the run-off election in the House.

 

The CDPJ is urging Komeito to cooperate with the opposition parties. Although Chief Representative of Komeito, Tetsuo Saito, denied Komeito’s voting for an opposition candidate, he stated that his party may consider how they will vote in possible run-off. If Komeito acts as an opposition party, the politics in Japan can drastically be changed in coming session of the Diet.

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