TOKYO (Reuters) – Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was projected to keep a majority in the upper house with its junior coalition partner in Sunday’s election, public broadcaster NHK reported.
The widely expected outcome comes two days after the fatal shooting of prominent LDP member and power broker, former premier Shinzo Abe.
The LDP and the Komeito party were likely to win between 69 83 seats out of the 125 contested in Sunday’s vote, according to NHK’s exit polls.
REACTION:
COREY WALLACE, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, KANAGAWA UNIVERSITY
“The exit polls are essentially in line with pre-election surveys by the media organisations. They suggest the LDP will do a little better in terms of overall seat numbers than they did in 2016 and 2019, but that has as much to do with opposition party weakness and weakened cooperation between the different parties.
“I cannot see any evidence in the exit polling suggesting a surge in support for the LDP that could be put down to Abe’s murder. Voter turnout also appears to be in line with expectations. A little bit up on 2019, but not much.”
AIRO HINO, POLITICAL SCIENCE PROFESSOR, WASEDA UNIVERSITY
“Looking at this, it appears the LDP will be able to extend its seats and there will be enough seats won through the various parties to have the two-thirds majority needed to revise the constitution. It’s pretty much as expected but the incident two days ago may well have had an impact.
“Now I think that with Kishida in power, debate over revising the constitution is likely to speed up.”
ROBERT WARD, JAPAN CHAIR, INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR STRATEGIC STUDIES
“No surprises. Need to wait now to see whether the pro-constitutional reform parties have their two-thirds majority. I still think Kishida will move cautiously, even if they do. Change will require considerable political capital – witness the intensity of the 2015 legal changes initiated by Abe to expand the role of the Self Defense Force.
“On defence, the Liberal Democratic Party manifesto promised defence spending would rise to 2% or more of GDP. Clearly, he (Kishida) now has a green light for this, although questions remain over what they’ll be spending the money on, where the money will come from.”
(Reporting by Ju-min Park, Elaine Lies, Leika Kihara; Editing by Chang-Ran Kim)
