Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe yesterday pledged to keep alive his plans to amend the nation’s pacifist constitution, despite failing to secure a “supermajority” in upper house elections.
His ruling coalition retained its majority in the upper house in Sunday’s vote for about the half the seats in the chamber, but fell short of securing a two-thirds majority in favor of revising the constitution.
“The hurdle of two-thirds in both the lower and upper houses is extremely high,” Abe told a news conference at his party headquarters.
Photo: AFP
“I want to produce a reform proposal that can be agreed upon by two-thirds beyond the borders of the ruling and opposition camps,” he said.
Abe has long harbored dreams of revising the constitution, which prohibits the country from waging war and maintaining a military.
However, public support for revising the document is low and there is discomfort with the idea even among the ruling coalition.
Experts said that since many within Abe’s coalition were already uneasy about the plans, the failure to secure a supermajority was unlikely to change the prime minister’s calculations significantly.
“Losing the supermajority is not necessarily a major setback for Abe,” analyst Tobias Harris of the Teneo consultancy group said in a note.
“Instead, by leading the ruling coalition to another national election victory — his sixth in his nearly seven years as LDP [Liberal Democratic Party] leader — Abe has cemented his status atop Japan’s political system,” Harris added.
The LDP and its coalition partner, Komeito, took 71 of the 124 seats up for grabs, accounting for about half of the upper chamber.
The two parties already control 70 seats in the other half of the 245-seat chamber that was not being contested.
Analysts said Abe’s coalition benefitted from a weak opposition, and voter turnout underscored apathy among the electorate, falling below 50 percent for the first time since a 1995 upper house election.
In related news, White House National Security Adviser John Bolton yesterday held talks with Japanese officials, presumably to discuss a US-led military coalition to safeguard shipping in the Strait of Hormuz amid escalating tensions in the region.
Abe yesterday said that before making a decision on joining the US, Japan would like to fulfil what it sees as a unique role it has to play in reducing tension.
“We have a long tradition of friendship with Iran and I’ve met with its president any number of times, as well as other leaders,” Abe said.
“Before we make any decisions on what to do, Japan would like to make every effort to reduce tensions between Iran and the United States.”
Bolton, after meeting with Japanese Minister of Foreign Affars Taro Kono, said they “covered a lot of ground,” but did not elaborate.
Japanese media said Bolton might also discuss an escalating spat between Japan and South Korea over trade and wartime labor issues.
Additional reporting by Reuters and AP
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