Noda dissolves lower house before election

By Hao Zhou Source:Global Times Published: 2012-11-17 0:45:04

Yoshihiko Noda, the sixth Japanese prime minister in six years, dissolved the lower house of parliament on Friday and cleared the way for a December 16 general election, pressured by the opposition to make good on his promise for a vote in return for supporting his policy to double sales tax.

"This is an election to decide on the nation's direction - to go forward or to go backward," Noda told a press conference, AFP reported.

But Noda's abrupt decision - a move that was opposed by many in the ruling Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) - has pushed at least nine of its 244 members in the 480-seat lower house to defect, which will cost the DPJ its majority in the lower house, according to the Asahi Shimbun newspaper.

The main opposition Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leader Shinzo Abe, who was prime minister in 2006-07, vowed to wage a "historic battle" to make a comeback three years after the LDP lost the 2009 election by a humiliating defeat.

"This fight is about restoring Japan. We will regain a strong economy. We'll restore foreign policy. We will strongly appeal to voters on the need to restore the Japan-US alliance, which was badly damaged by the DPJ government," Abe told a news conference after the lower house was dissolved.

The approval rate for Noda's cabinet has plummeted to an all-time low of 17.7 percent. At the same time, the support rate for the DPJ stood at 12.1 percent, compared with the LDP's 25.7 percent, according to a new poll.

"The DPJ bet on Noda's experience in dealing with economic problems when choosing him as the party leader. But while Noda disappointed most Japanese in terms of the economy, he also threw Japan's diplomatic relations with its neighbors into a mess," said Lü Fuhai, a Beijing-based independent analyst of Japanese politics.

"Currently, what matters in Japan's domestic politics is neither political doctrines nor territorial disputes but only people's daily lives, which can be seen through the prism of the names of new parties recently set up by influential politicians, such as Toru Hashimoto's Japan Restoration Party and Ichiro Ozawa's the People's Lives First party," Lü told the Global Times on Friday.

The LDP looks likely to win the most seats in the lower house poll, but a lack of voter enthusiasm makes it uncertain whether the party and its former junior partner, the New Komeito party, can win a majority, Reuters said.

If not, the LDP will need to seek another coalition partner either from among a string of new, small parties, or even what's left of the DPJ after the election, it added.

A "third force" is also emerging in Japan to counter the LDP and the DPJ's dominance in elections. Former Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara, who launched the Sunrise Party on Tuesday, was reportedly in discussion with Hashimoto about a merger of their parties ahead of the December election.

"Japan is seemingly going through a chaotic and unstable era. We don't know where Japan, led by a new generation of politicians, is headed," said Lü. "But as elder Japanese politicians have said, the new generation, which only has a lust for votes, is unaccountable to the country."

Separately, the new Japanese ambassador to China, Masato Kitera, a career diplomat now working as assistant chief cabinet secretary, is scheduled to arrive in China in late December after the parliamentary election, Kyodo News reported.

China's foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei said China hopes that Japan will make "substantial efforts" to tackle the China-Japan diplomatic impasse, which is "totally caused by the Japanese side."

Agencies contributed to this story



Posted in: Asia-Pacific

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