TOKYO: Candidates in Japan’s super-tight election made last-ditch appeals to voters on Saturday, with opinion polls suggesting the ruling coalition might fall short of a majority.

Such a bombshell outcome in Sunday’s vote would be the worst result for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) since 2009, and potentially a knockout blow to Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.

Ishiba — a fan of trains, 1970s pop idols and making model ships and planes — only last month took the helm of the LDP, which has governed Japan for almost all of the past seven decades.

After a tough internal contest, the 67-year-old former defence minister became premier on Oct 1. Days later, he called the snap parliamentary elections, promising a “new Japan”.

Ishiba pledged to revitalise depressed rural regions and to address the “quiet emergency” of Japanos falling population through family-friendly policies such as flexible working hours. But he has since rowed back his position on issues including allowing married couples to take separate surnames.

Rising prices have rankled voters, and also dogging Ishiba is the fallout from a party slush fund scandal that helped sink his predecessor, Fumio Kishida.

A poll by the Yomiuri Shimbun daily suggested that the LDP and its coalition partner Komeito might struggle to get the 233 lower house seats needed for a majority.

Ishiba has set this threshold as his objective, and missing it would undermine his position in the LDP and mean finding other coalition partners or leading a minority government.

‘Start afresh’

Local media speculated that Ishiba could potentially even resign immediately to take responsibility, becoming Japan’s shortest-serving prime minister in the post-war period.

The current record is held by Naruhiko Higashikuni who served for 54 days — four days more than British leader Liz Truss in 2022 — just after Japan’s 1945 defeat in World War II.

“The situation is extremely severe,” Ishiba reportedly said on Friday, though at a rally on Saturday, he made a fresh promise of renewal to hundreds of supporters. “We want to start afresh as a fair, just and sincere party, and seek your mandate,” he said.

In many districts, LDP candidates are in neck-and-neck battles with those from the Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) — the second-biggest in parliament — led by popular former prime minister Yoshihiko Noda.

“The LDP’s politics is all about quickly implementing policies for those who give them loads of cash,” Noda said at a rally. “But those in vulnerable positions, who can’t offer cash, have been ignored,” he added, accusing the LDP-led government of offering insufficient support for survivors of an earthquake in central Japan.

Published in Dawn, October 27th, 2024