An opposition emerges
By Takuya Nishimura, Senior Fellow, Former Editorial Writer for The Hokkaido ShimbunThe views expressed by the author are his own and are not associated with The Hokkaido Shimbun
You can find his blog, J Update here.
December 16, 2024. Special to Asia Policy Point
The year 2024 will be remembered as a time of major transition in Japanese politics. An epoch-making event was the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s (LDP) loss of its majority in the House of Representatives, which resulted in a hung parliament. It is likely that politics in Japan has entered an era in which the LDP can no longer enjoy unilateral dominance, and no policy decision can be made without the support of other parties.
Since December 2012, when it retook leadership of the Diet from the Democratic Party of Japan, the LDP has maintained its leadership with the help of a coalition partner, Komeito. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expanded the political base of the LDP by focusing on the growth-oriented economic policy known as Abenomics. Abe also introduced the tactic of early snap elections before opposition parties are ready for them.
After Abe stepped down in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, the LDP’s decline became apparent. Abenomics proved unable to raise the real wages of workers. Revelations about the Abe faction’s unlawful management of political funds led to a miserable defeat in the general election of the Lower House in October 2024. The assassination of Abe in 2022 and political confusion afterward marked the end of LDP-dominant politics.
Kishida tried to leave Abe-politics behind. He relied on his liberal principles and his Kochi-kai faction. He failed, however, to control the conservative colleagues of Abe. Ishiba, an outspoken opponent of Abe, is promoting moderate politics and listening to voices from the opposition parties. This stance became possible from the decline of conservative power in the LDP caused by the slush fund scandal and the party losing its majority in the Lower House.
One event that symbolized the coming of a new political era in 2024 was the revision of a budget bill, for the first time since 1996, in the extraordinary session of the Diet in December. The budget bill, coupled with the threat of a non-confidence resolution, is recognized as the most important issue, and the leading parties and the oppositions may be sharply at odds over it. The leading party would not easily accept amendments to a budget bill once it has been submitted to the Diet.
In the case of this year’s supplemental budget bill, the opposition leader, the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDPJ), criticized the bill for including unnecessary spending and lacking sufficient financial support for reconstruction in the Noto Peninsula following last January’s earthquake. The Ishiba Cabinet resubmitted the bill with a reduction in the total budget from 13.9 trillion yen to 12.5 trillion yen.
Nevertheless, the CDPJ did not vote for the revised budget bill in the Plenary Session in an effort to establish itself as the principal opposition party. Two other opposition parties, the Democratic Party for the People (DPP) and Japan Innovation Party (Nippon Ishin-no Kai) joined with the LDP to pass the bill.
The LDP considers the DPP the opposition power most open to its appeals for legislative action. The DPP principal concern is tax policy, including expansion of the tax credit. The LDP and Komeito found support among members of the DPP to raise the threshold for imposing income tax from 1.03 million yen in annual income to 1.78 million yen beginning in FY 2026. Gaining the support of one or more opposition parties for each piece of legislation will become the new mission for the minority government of the LDP and Komeito.
Although the LDP managed to maintain its control of the government by replacing Fumio Kishida with Ishiba, the approval rating for the Ishiba Cabinet in the polls has not risen. In the polls of major newspapers in December, the approval rating for the Ishiba Cabinet was 36 percent in Asahi Shimbun, 30 percent in Mainichi Shimbun and 39 percent in Yomiuri Shimbun. These percentages represent a significant decline from October, when the Ishiba administration took power, by ten to sixteen percentage points.
On political reform, the LDP has yet to meet the expectations of the Japanese public. Seventy-three percent of those polled in Asahi and 86 percent in Yomiuri disapproved of Ishiba’s handling of changes to political fundraising and expenditure. Ishiba wants to add greater transparency to the Political Funds Control Act before the end of this year, but he seems to have no viable strategy for accumulating the necessary majority of votes.
As to another reform topic, the future of the policy activities fund, the LDP agreed with the CDPJ on abolishing it. Although the LDP wanted to reserve some exceptions of disclosure for spending in diplomatic activities, it finally withdrew its proposal after receiving consistent resistance from the opposition parties.
The leading parties and the opposition also reached a deal in which they would conclude on the abolition of political contributions by companies and organizations by March 2025. This means that they could not settle the most controversial issue in political reform by the end of the year.
This kind of struggle over legislation will be the order of the day in the Diet for the next year. In the ordinary session of the Diet, expected to be convoked in January, the debate among the parties over the FY 2025 budget will be contentious. It is too early to say whether the Ishiba Cabinet will survive to the election of the Upper House next summer.
