TOKYO, Dec. 15 (PNA/Xinhua) — Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s ruling coalition won Japan’s general election, media exit polls showed Sunday, in a landslide win that has seen the ruling coalition maintain its two-thirds majority in the lower house of parliament.
“We received a vote of confidence on the administration of the past two years,” said Abe, describing the election as a referendum on “Abenomics” – the premiere’s own aggressive blend of economic policies. The soon-to-be reelected prime minister went on to assure the electorate that he would continue to be a humble, hardworking leader.
“I will try to gain public support when carrying out policies without being complacent,” he said after learning that his party had achieved at least an “absolute stable majority” of 266 seats in the lower house, as he placed red roses next to the names of the winning LDP lawmakers across a number of constituencies in Japan.
While Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and junior coalition Komeito ally are likely to secure a two-thirds majority win in the lower house, the gap between the LDP and opposition parties has significantly widened, with the ruling bloc likely winning between 306 and 341 seats in the 475-seat chamber, according to public broadcaster NHK.
Other private media exit polls have projected the ruling coalition may have won a combined total of 328 seats, up from 293 before Abe called a snap election, that many of the public felt was “unnecessary” and “confusing.”
Gaining the two-thirds majority means the ruling bloc is now in a position to controversially amend Japan’s constitution, allowing the self-defense Forces the right to collective self-defense, which has sparked outrage both at home and abroad.
“The LDP and Komeito have reached our goal of securing at least a combined majority,” Abe said on a TV program after seeing his coalition had garnered the requisite number of seats in the election.
Together with coalition ally “we will implement what we promised in our election campaigning,” Abe said, adding that he would now try to seek the public’s understanding of his plans to amend the nation’s pacifist constitution.
“To amend the constitution has been our party’s long-cherished wish since its establishment,” Abe said. “We will emphasize the need to amend the constitution and make efforts to see growing public debate on the issue.”
He also promised to work on national security legislation in the next Diet session and “promote” the relocation of a controversial U.S. airbase in Okinawa Prefecture, while pledging to ease the base-hosting burdens of the locals.
The prime minister, in his first public words since winning Sunday’s election, also vowed to raise the sales tax again to 10 percent in April 2017, regardless of the state of the economy at the time. The first hike from 5 to 8 percent in April saw the nation plunged into recession after two consecutive quarters of economic contraction, according to the latest GDP figures.
Despite voter apathy and inclement weather in many parts of Japan which have made the turnout drop to an all-time low, the result was a foregone conclusion. If the ruling bloc has expanded its majority above the 317-seat benchmark in the lower house, as many exit polls are now showing, the LDP will have final say in matters that are at loggerheads in parliament’s upper house, as the ruling bloc will be in a position to overturn upper house decisions.
Many Japanese however opted to abstain Sunday from a vote many deemed “pointless,” as the outcome was already largely predetermined. Election authorities said voter turnout stood at 52. 7 percent, taking over from a post-war low of 59.3 percent booked in the 2012 election.
The opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), for its part, was on the receiving end of a battering, relinquishing at least 23 of its seats in the lower house, according to media projections, and the “third force” parties also failed to gain ground in the latest vote.
DPJ Secretary General Yukio Edano, whose party has been plagued by infighting, factionalism and leadership woes, told reporters that the election was a chance for the party to rebuild.
“I hope that the election will become our first, solid step for recovery,” Edano said, declining to comment on whether its leader, Banri Kaieda, would step down for the party’s failure at the polls.
It was, however, a successful day for the Japan Communist Party (JCP), who attained at least 13 seats, up from its pre-election total of eight. The party is also, for the first time in 18 years, assured of winning in a single-seat constituency in Okinawa Prefecture.
JCP politician Seiken Akamine won monumental local support from those in Japan’s southernmost prefecture opposed to the central government’s plans to relocate a U.S. airbase from the crowded district of Ginowan to a pristine coastal region also on the island..
Abe himself, henceforth, is now expected to be re-elected as Japan’s 97th prime minister during a special parliamentary session and form his new Cabinet on or around Dec. 24, sources close to him said Sunday.
Provided he survives next September’s LDP presidential election, the prime minister could have four clear years ahead to fulfill his own legacies, which include “Abenomics” and implementing its elusive “third arrow” of structural reforms and seeing Japan chart a course toward maintaining a more “proactive” military. The majority of Japanese believe the country should stick to its time- honored pacifist constitution. (PNA/Xinhua)