TOKYO: Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba was clinging on Monday even after his coalition disastrously lost its upper house majority, as painful new US tariffs loom.<\/p>\n
The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has governed almost continuously since 1955, and its partner Komeito had to win 50 seats in Sunday\u2019s election but they fell three short, national broadcaster NHK reported.<\/p>\n
Voters angry at inflation turned to other parties, notably the \u201cJapanese first\u201d Sanseito, which made strong gains with its \u201canti-globalist\u201d drive echoing the agenda of populist parties elsewhere.<\/p>\n
\u201cI even think (the LDP) should have lost more,\u201d 25-year-old Kazuyo Nanasawa, who voted for a small ultra-conservative party, said, adding that Ishiba should quit.<\/p>\n
The debacle comes only months after Ishiba\u2019s coalition was forced into a minority government in the more powerful lower house, in the LDP\u2019s worst result in 15 years.<\/p>\n
But asked late Sunday if he intended to remain in office, Ishiba told local media: \u201cThat\u2019s right.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe deadline of (US) tariffs is coming on August 1. Until then we have to do our best with our body and soul,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
If Ishiba does go, it was unclear who might step up to replace him now that the government needs opposition support in both chambers to pass legislation.<\/p>\n
LDP supporter Takeshi Nemoto, 80, said that a new leadership contest \u201cwould be a losing battle\u201d for the party, further complicating tariff talks with US President Donald Trump\u2019s administration.<\/p>\n
\u201cDiplomacy is under pressure at the moment,\u201d agreed Shuhei Aono, 67. \u201cWho is going to take care of it? I think (Ishiba) cannot easily withdraw.\u201d<\/p>\n
The election saw 125 seats in the 248-seat upper house contested.<\/p>\n
The coalition needed 50 of those but local media reported they only won 47, with the LDP winning 39 and Komeito eight, giving them 122 deputies.<\/p>\n
Second-placed was the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP), which won 22 contested seats, followed by the Democratic Party For the People (DPP) with 17.<\/p>\n
The right-wing Sanseito party won 14 seats.<\/p>\n
Sanseito wants \u201cstricter rules and limits\u201d on immigration, opposes \u201cradical\u201d gender policies, and wants a rethink on decarbonization and vaccines.<\/p>\n
It was forced last week to deny any links to Moscow \u2014 which has backed populist parties elsewhere \u2014 after a candidate was interviewed by Russian state media.<\/p>\n
The opposition is fragmented, and chances are slim that the parties can form an alternative government, Hidehiro Yamamoto, politics and sociology professor at the University of Tsukuba, said.<\/p>\n
Expanding the coalition would be difficult, with the DPP the most likely partner \u201con the condition that (the government) delivers some of the positive fiscal measures, such as tax cuts,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
More likely is that Ishiba will continue needing opposition support on a case-by-case basis to pass legislation.<\/p>\n
In return the opposition could press for consumption tax to be cut or abolished, something which Ishiba has opposed in view of Japan\u2019s colossal national debts of over 200 percent of gross domestic product.<\/p>\n
After years of stagnant or falling prices, consumers in the world\u2019s fourth-largest economy have been squeezed by inflation since Russia\u2019s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n
In particular, the price of rice has doubled, squeezing many household budgets despite government handouts.<\/p>\n
Not helping is lingering resentment about an LDP funding scandal, and US tariffs of 25 percent due to bite from August 1 if there is no trade deal with the United States.<\/p>\n
Japanese imports are already subject to a 10 percent tariff, while the auto industry, which accounts for eight percent of jobs, is reeling from a 25 percent levy.<\/p>\n
Despite Ishiba securing an early meeting with Trump in February, there has been no trade accord. On Monday tariffs envoy Ryosei Akazawa left on his eighth visit to Washington.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no impact from the election result (on the negotiations),\u201d Akazawa told reporters at Tokyo\u2019s Haneda airport, saying that Japan\u2019s national interest remained the \u201ctop priority.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
TOKYO: Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba was clinging on Monday even after his coalition disastrously lost its upper house majority, as painful new US tariffs loom. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has governed almost continuously since 1955, and its partner Komeito had to win 50 seats in Sunday\u2019s election but they fell three short, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":84040,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84028","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84028","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84028"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84028\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84043,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84028\/revisions\/84043"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}