Campaigning gets under way for upper house election

TOKYO, June 24 Kyodo -
Official campaigning got under way Thursday for the closely contested July 11
House of Councillors election, with representatives of political parties taking
to the streets along with aspirants who filed their candidacies.
It will be the first full-fledged contest since the Democratic Party of Japan
ousted the Liberal Democratic Party in a House of Representatives election last
August, and also the first since Prime Minister Naoto Kan took office earlier
this month.
A total of 438 people, including 100 women, filed for candidacy with election
boards across Japan for the triennial poll in which half of the upper chamber's
242 seats will be up for grabs, with the fate of the DPJ-led ruling camp's
majority at stake.
They included 187 candidates on the lists for the poll's proportional
representation section submitted by all the 12 political parties and groups
poised to vie for 48 seats. The remaining 251 will run in 47 prefecture-based
constituencies, to which 73 seats in total are allocated. The total number of
candidates was up 61 from the previous upper house election in 2007.
Making his first stump speech for the race in Osaka, Kan said in front of an
audience of more than 1,000 people, ''What helped the economy to flounder is a
wrong economic policy. I promise to rebuild the economy for sure and put Japan
on a growth track.''
Kan also touched on the hot issue of a future consumption tax hike, saying, ''I
hate to talk about raising consumption and other taxes, but it could become
like (debt crisis-hit) Greece in one or two years.''
''Please understand that we will discuss the matter with other parties,'' he
said, but earned only scattered applause.
LDP President Sadakazu Tanigaki said in Kofu, Yamanashi Prefecture, ''This is
an election in which whether the LDP can be entrusted again will be tested as
well as the rating of the DPJ-led government.''
''We will have to stop the dole-out policy of the DPJ government for the sake
of the next generation,'' he said, also citing the example of the Greek
sovereign debt crisis.
Attention is focused on whether Kan's government can hold public support
despite his willingness to discuss the potentially contentious issue of a hike
in the 5 percent consumption tax. Public approval of the Cabinet rebounded to
over 60 percent after Kan took office on June 8 but fell somewhat after he
clarified his stance on the tax issue.
The envisioned tax hike drew resistance not only from smaller opposition
parties such as Your Party, the Social Democratic Party and the Japanese
Communist Party, but also from the DPJ's tiny coalition partner, the People's
New Party.
''Is such a thing permissible?'' said PNP head Shizuka Kamei in an address in
Tokyo.
Even if the ruling bloc fails to retain a majority, it would not immediately
affect the DPJ's grip on power as it holds a comfortable majority in the more
powerful House of Representatives, but such a result could impact Kan's party
leadership and prompt the DPJ to seek a broader alliance or otherwise face a
policy deadlock.
The DPJ-PNP coalition needs to secure at least 56 of the 121 seats to be
contested to keep a majority in the upper house.
Kan is aiming to at least maintain his party's current 54 such seats, while
Tanigaki has staked his status as LDP leader on the opposition camp blocking
the ruling coalition from retaining its upper house majority. The LDP and other
opposition parties need 66 seats to do so.
Unlike Tanigaki, Kan said Thursday night when he appeared live on an NHK news
program that he had no idea of resigning as DPJ chief in case the party fails
to win 54 seats.
The opposition camp also confronted the ruling bloc over money scandals and the
controversial government plan to relocate a key U.S. military base within
Okinawa Prefecture that forced Kan's predecessor Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama
and DPJ Secretary General Ichiro Ozawa to resign abruptly in early June.
SDP leader Mizuho Fukushima maintained her party's opposition to moving the
Marine Corps' Futenma Air Station within Okinawa, following its breakaway late
last month from the ruling camp in protest against the government plan
reaffirmed with the United States, a position echoed by New Renaissance Party
leader Yoichi Masuzoe.
New Komeito leader Natsuo Yamaguchi called for clean politics in Saitama,
saying, ''The true nature of the DPJ has not changed by a mere change of the
prime minister. It says it will pursue clean politics, but just hiding former
Secretary General Ozawa will not lead to any solution.''
LDP Secretary General Tadamori Oshima said in Sapporo, ''The DPJ has not
fulfilled its accountability nor drawn a line about the problem of politics and
money.''
Some new parties also hope to offer a third choice for voters discontented with
both major parties.
Masuzoe in Tokushima called for a realignment of Japan's political landscape
and Yoshimi Watanabe of Your Party a thorough streamlining into a small
government. Sunrise Party of Japan leader Takeo Hiranuma proposed revising the
Constitution from a conservative standpoint in Tokyo.
Your Party is aiming to win at least 20 seats and the Sunrise Party of Japan at
least seven, while among existing minor parties, New Komeito hopes to win at
least 11 seats and the Japanese Communist Party at least six.
==Kyodo