Polls in Japan for a Change?

- ByDr. Abdul Ruff Colachal

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The second largest global economy - after the USA - and the close terror coalition partner of the USA and its terrible NATO, Japan which occupies Afghanistan illegally, has been undergoing horrible domestic downtown just as it faces serious economic meltdown. Continued political instability in Japan has led to the ongoing polls.

With the recent opinion polls predicting victory for the opposition Democratic Party of Japan after more than 50 years of almost unbroken rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), voting which is under way in Japan in a general election, looks set to bring a historic change of government. Voting conditions were not ideal, as a government warning that a swine flu epidemic was under way combined with muggy hot temperatures and typhoon-triggered rough weather around different parts of the country. The total number of ballots polled is slightly less than in 2005 when elections saw the charismatic Junichiro Koizumi's LDP returned with a significant majority. Several media polls predict that the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) will win more than 300 seats in the 480-seat lower house of parliament, reversing the election result of 2005.  Japanese media will announce exit polls immediately after the close of the poll.

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has ruled for more than 50 years, with just one single break of less than one year. The conservative LDP, currently led by Prime Minister Taro Aso, has governed Japan for all but 11 months since 1955. Japan is suffering record unemployment and its economy is struggling to emerge from a bruising recession. Voters blame the LDP for the current economic malaise - and are angry enough to opt for change. Japan has been wracked by its steepest recession in decades, and analysts say this could harm the LDP's chances. Even though the latest figures show the economy is now growing again, Prime Minister Taro Aso - the LDP leader - admits few people have felt the benefit yet.

The centrist DPJ says it will shift the focus of government from supporting corporations to helping consumers and workers - challenging the status quo that has existed since the end of World War II. It has promised to cut waste within the bureaucracy and use the funds to increase welfare spending. There were all pledges of generous allowances for children, pension reforms and tax cuts, but the opposition has offered few explanations of how to pay for the plans beyond eliminating waste. As campaigning drew to a close, DPJ leader Yukio Hatoyama called for change, and outlined his vision of a stronger social welfare system and less bureaucracy. Hatoyama said that voters were about to change history. "We will press ahead," Aso said, boasting of his party's financial stimulus measures a day after new data showed the country - Asia's biggest economy - had lifted out of recession.

Decline of LDP and Rise of opposition

Founded in 1955, the Liberal Democratic Party LDP helped transform Japan into an industrial giant. Working closely with bureaucrats and the business sector, the LDP-led government delivered high growth, ample jobs and a steep rise in living standards. But cracks emerged when the bubble burst in the early 1990s. Jobs were no longer for life, a gap emerged between rich and poor and demographic change posed a challenge. Women were having fewer babies and the population was ageing - with serious implications for social security. Reform was needed but the close bureaucratic and business links that had benefited the LDP also served to constrain it. Efforts foundered in the face of entrenched vested interests. Briefly ousted in 1993, the LDP got back in via a coalition deal with its rival, the Japan Socialist Party.

But over the next decade it did not deal with the fundamental issue of why it had lost power - and calls for change were getting louder.

Four years ago, Junichiro Koizumi led Japan's ruling party to a landslide election victory. The Liberal Democratic Party won a two-thirds majority and a seemingly unshakeable mandate. The opposition was demoralized and Katsuya Okada, leader of the trounced Democratic Party of Japan, stepped down. Now things have changed. Voters have deserted the ruling party; support for its beleaguered leader, Taro Aso, is less than 20%. The DPJ looks set to oust the LDP for only the second time in five decades, perhaps even reversing the landslide of 2005. That means something has gone wrong with ruling dispensation.

Then Junichiro Koizumi came along and bought the LDP more time. He promised economic reform and reached out to urban voters by bringing more women and experts into his government. He vowed to curb the giant public works projects that brought the LDP rural votes and to privatise the post office - a policy that put him on a collision course with his own party. When his reforms were voted down in parliament, he expelled LDP lawmakers who opposed him and called a snap election. He portrayed the poll as a fight against traditionalists within his own party who were resisting change - and voters backed him in huge numbers. "In 2005 it was not the LDP that was popular, it was Koizumi - and what Koizumi said was that he would change Japan by changing the LDP.

When Koizumi stepped down in 2006, things quickly went downhill. Japan's system of hereditary politicians had led "to a significant diminishing in the pool of talent" within the LDP. Koizumi's three successors - all sons or grandsons of former prime ministers - lacked his style. All came under fire for poor cabinet choices and their handling of ministerial scandals. Koizumi's reform agenda was also watered down, leaving some voters feeling betrayed. Shinzo Abe, who replaced Koizumi, focused on issues such as patriotism and constitutional reform. But voters did not care. Instead, they were outraged by the loss of pension payment records. They vented their anger in upper house elections in 2007, awarding control to the DPJ. Abe stood down and Yasuo Fukuda took over, but legislative deadlock led to his grey-faced resignation months later.

Then Taro Aso took office - and the economic crisis hit. Giants such as Toyota posted their first annual losses in decades. Businesses empowered by Koizumi-era labour reforms cut contract staff loose. Graduates failed to find jobs and unemployment soared.  Aso did not help matters by making a series of embarrassing gaffes. His cabinet served him poorly too, his finance minister seemed to be drunk at a G8 summit, though he blamed cold remedies for his slurred speech. A groundswell of public unhappiness coincided with the emergence of the DPJ as a credible alternative - and one with a manifesto promising welfare spending.

Part of the problem was that the LDP was slow to get things done, because it was trying to keep a variety of interest groups happy. The LDP could deliver big building projects, but not fix the economy. Demands that were not met at all finally built up to the point where people were no longer interested in dams and roads. Urban voters also felt marginalized as funds flowed to projects benefiting the LDP's rural support base. There was a general feeling that the LDP was losing touch and that it wasn't delivering for everybody. Many feel that ruling dispensation is working for small cliques and business groups, rather than what was good for Japan as a whole.

Key issues

Both parties say the Japan-US alliance is at the core of their diplomacy, although the DPJ says it wants to create a "more equal" relationship and review the issue of US military bases in Japan. Both parties say the Japan-US alliance is at the core of their diplomacy, although the DPJ says it wants to create a "more equal" relationship and review the issue of US military bases in Japan. Both promise to take a tough stance towards North Korea.  The LDP says it wants look at revising Japan's pacifist constitution, which prohibits the retention of armed forces for anything other than self-defence. On China and others, both have almost identical stances

Both parties say the economy is their main focus. The LDP says it will create 2% growth within two years and two million jobs in three. It also plans to increase household disposable income by one million yen ($10,700; £6,600) in a decade. It says it will raise the 5% consumption tax (the equivalent of value-added tax) to generate revenue, but only when the economy is back on track. The DPJ says it will not raise the consumption tax for at least four years. It also plans to lower fuel tax and corporate tax for small businesses. It also plans to introduce a minimum guaranteed pension and abolish compulsory health insurance payments for people over the age of 75. It says it will fund pre-school education for children between the ages of three and five, and expand student scholarships. The DPJ also wants to appoint politicians to supervise ministries and in so doing control waste.

Aso questioned whether the DPJ had enough experience to govern. The DPJ already controls Japan's upper house with the support of smaller parties including the Social Democrats. It won control of the house in July 2007, amid voters' anger at a series of scandals and the loss of millions of pension payment records.

Post Script

There is the possibility that Japan's long-time ruling LDP may be ousted in the 30 August election by the Democratic Party of Japan it trounced fours years ago. Many voters have criticized the frequent changes in Japan's leadership since Koizumi stepped down in 2006. "It's nonsense to see four prime ministers in four years without asking for the people's opinion," he said. "I think we need a change now," 68-year-old Tokyo pensioner Toshihiro Nakamura was quoted as saying by AFP news agency. It's too long for a single party to dominate national politics. Voters seem to desire for change after so many years under the LDP could be a crucial factor. It looks like the election being “more about emotions than policies. Most voters are making the decision not about policies but about whether they are fed up with the ruling party. The DPJ is on the brink of a fairly sizeable win. Whether it can effect the change that voters want, though, is another question. Another more e critical question is whether or not Japan would walk out of the NATO rogues coalition to kill defenseless Muslims after invading Islamic world illegally. After all, the illegal occupation of Islamic world by the NATO is the prime cause of all troubles the Western nations and their Eastern terror allies, like India and Israel, face today. As the victim of US nuclear experiement in 1945, Japan should have opposed the NATO illegal invasions of Islamic world and genocides in Iraq, Afghanistan as well as destabilization of Pakistan. Victory for the oppositon does not indicate any change of external policies of Japan.

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Dr. Abdul Ruff Colachal

Specialist on State Terrorism

Independent Researcher in International Affairs, The only Indian to have gone through entire India, a fraud and terror nation in South Asia.