Landslide Victory of Takaichi

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, as the president of Liberal Democratic Party, achieved a landslide victory in general election of the House of Representatives voted on February 8th. The LDP obtained a record high of two-thirds majority with 316 seats out of 465 (68 percent) in the House, based on extraordinarily high popularity of Takaichi.

With 36 seats of Japan Innovation Party (JIP), the leading coalition occupies 352 seats (75 percent). The LDP received so many votes beyond the number of candidates on its slate in proportional district that it gave away 14 seats to other parties.

 

An opposition coalition instantly established for the election, Centrist Reform Alliance (CRA), sank from 167 to 49, losing support for their cause of building centrist power. Populist parties such as Democratic Party for the People (DPP), Sanseito and new party “Team Mirai” could not make as a great progress as expected, due to a stunning advance of the LDP. Leftist parties such as Japan Communist Party, Reiwa Shinsengumi significantly lost its seats.

 

Next Diet session will be convoked mid-February. All the minister of Takaichi Cabinet including Takaichi herself will resign on the first day and she will be reelected next prime minister. The second Takaichi Cabinet will immediately be formed with new ministers.

 

It was unusual for a prime minister to have a snap election to reconfirm popularity of her/his cabinet. It was a campaign strategy for Takaichi to turn the public eyes from policies she had taken. “Give me a mandate to promote policies that may divide public opinion into two,” she asked through the campaign. Basically, divisive policies should not be taken by the leader of a nation.

 

Her mismanagements in her speech did not matter for the voters. Her careless comment on Taiwan contingency in November or her approval of depreciation of Japanese yen during election campaign did not put any major negative impact on the election. Although Weekly Bunshun magazine reported close relationship between Takaichi and former Unification Church during the campaign, support for Takaichi rather surged as campaign continued.

 

In a couple of previous elections, the LDP lost its seats with scandal over management of political funds. However, the LDP accumulated its seats in this election, despite Takaichi’s decision of giving party endorsement to the candidates involved in the scandal. Even though the Lower House election would fundamentally not be a referendum for a prime minister, voters favored Takaichi’s presentation as a leader working hard in political community which is supposed to be dominated by male, regardless the policies she upheld.

 

Another major reason for LDP’s victory was failure of the CRA which was formed with merge of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDPJ) and Komeito. The CRA was expected to occupy certain share of seats with support of organizations. The CDPJ has comprehensive support from labor unions and Komeito has been firmly supported by a religious group, Soka Gakkai. It is estimated that members of Soka Gakkai steadily voted for the CRA in this election, but the voters for former CDPJ did not give strong support for the CRA.

 

Before the election, the CDPJ had 148 seats in the Lower House and Komeito did 24. It is likely that the power of CDPJ was mostly given by swing voters, who had been critical against the LDP with kickback fund scandal in the last Lower House election. Those swing voters have returned to the LDP in this election, approving Takaichi Cabinet. Moreover, some policy compromises by former CDPJ, namely approval of 2015 security legislation to exercise collective self-defense right or abandon of no nuclear power plant policy, alienated traditional CDPJ supporters from the CRA.

 

As a result of losing public support, the CRA lost skilled veteran lawmakers, including the founder of CDPJ, Yukio Edano. Co-leaders of CRA, Yoshihiko Noda and Tetsuo Saito, expressed their intention of stepping down. Anti-LDP liberal power overwhelmingly shrank.

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