CRS Destined to Be Divided

The Centrist Reform Alliance (CRA), the greatest power among the opposition parties in Lower House of the Diet, is destined to be divided into two with a failure in integrating their former colleagues in the Upper House. Their attempt to build a major power against Sanae Takaichi administration was deadlocked, with internal discordance over policies and elections. Absence of powerful opposition power encourages Takaichi to promote her own agenda which may not be preferrable to majority of the people. 

The CRA was established in January with merger by Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDPJ) and Komeito to counter ruling coalition by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and Japan Innovation Party (JIP). Although the new party was formed by the Lower House members of CDPJ and Komeito, who were preparing for the election, the CRA leaders expected that Upper House members of both parties would join the new party later.

 

However, serious setback in the election urged those Upper House members to reconsider 

the integration. Recognizing the situation that the merger did not work for accumulating votes for the party, most local members of the parties, namely with the CDPJ, realized that would not be able to share the same policy, such as revision of 2015 security legislation or elimination of nuclear power plants. The leader of CDPJ, Shun-ichi Mizuoka, announced that his party would not join the CRA on August 28th.

 

The leaders of three parties, with Jun-ya Ogawa of the CRA and Toshiko Takeya of Komeito officially agreed on abandoning the integration of the three parties on August 31st. While the CRA and CDPJ hoped to maintain their cooperative framework in both chambers of the Diet, Komeito was reluctant to it. Komeito is not hopeful for implementing their policies in the framework with CRA or CDPJ. Some members in the Komeito look to cooperation with Democratic Party for the People or even LDP.

 

Thus, next issue is where the CRA is going. There is an argument in Komeito to leave the CRA, canceling the merger with the CDPJ eight months ago. In the leaders’ meeting at the end of August, Secretary General of Komeito, Makoto Nishida, clearly rejected the idea of forming a parliamentary group with the CRA or CDPJ, raising difference over core policies.

 

Prime Minister Takaichi is reportedly considering an extraordinary session of the Diet starting early October. It is unclear whether the CRA maintains itself to the session. It is expected that Takaichi will submit bills to the session, which are related to her policies including consumption tax cut or reduction of Lower House seats. the CDPJ and Komeito may respectively deal with those issues.

 

The CRA was established to rally fragmented alternative powers to the LDP. But the respondents were only the CDPJ and Komeito in the Lower House. Although they expected some LDP lawmakers would leave their party and join the CRA, those LDP members rather chose staying. That was the biggest miscalculation for the CRA.

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