Japan’s ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), chaired by new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and the Komeito Party, is guaranteed to lose its majority in the key lower house of parliament following Sunday’s elections. This forecast was made by Japanese public television (NHK)
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Based on the votes counted, NHK concluded that the ruling coalition was guaranteed to fall short of the 233 seats needed for a majority in the lower house of parliament. In the most positive scenario, the LDP and Komeito will gain only 232 seats, but it is predicted that the real result will be much weaker – in their worst case, they will receive only 174 seats. This is the first time since 2009 that the ruling bloc in Japan, following the election results, did not gain more than half of the lower house of parliament.
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At the same time, the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) of the country can significantly improve its position following the election results, gaining up to 191 seats.
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The further fate of the Japanese government will be decided in the light of the agreements that the parties can reach among themselves. Prime Minister and LDP Chairman Shigeru Ishiba has already said that he is considering expanding the ruling coalition in order to obtain the seats necessary to form his government. At the same time, the leaders of small opposition parties have already stated that a coalition with the LDP is out of the question. But difficulties with the formation of a coalition government also threaten the main opposition CDP, since it has serious differences in views on some issues with small opposition parties.
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The elections took place with a rather weak turnout – according to the country’s Ministry of Administrative Affairs and Communications, at 19:30 local time (13:30 Moscow time) the turnout was 31.52%. This is by 2.8 percentage points. lower than in 2021, the last time Japan held elections to the lower house of parliament.
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In the last elections, 1,344 candidates competed for 289 seats, which will be determined by voting in single-member constituencies, and 176 seats, which will be distributed through voting according to the proportional system (party lists). The ruling party approached the early elections, which the new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba announced before he had yet assumed the post of head of government, not only with low ratings, undermined by a large-scale financial scandal in the collection of political donations, but also with divisive internal party sentiments. In the worst-case scenario for the ruling party, the opposition could form a coalition government, as happened once before in 1993.
