Koike leaves door open on PM post

Tokyo governor won’t name candidate as parties brace for election campaign

TOKYO — Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike does not expect her new conservative party to pick a candidate for prime minister during the campaign for the Oct 22 election, leaving the door open to eventually backing a lawmaker from Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s party.

Koike’s new Party of Hope has emerged as a serious challenge to Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party supporter base, but she has said she would not personally contest the election.

Abe called the snap election last month in hopes his ruling bloc would keep its majority in parliament’s lower house, where it now has a two-thirds “super” majority.

Losing a simple majority would be a major unexpected upset, but a poor performance by the LDP could put pressure on Abe to step down.

Asked in an interview published on Saturday by the Asahi newspaper whether Koike’s party would pick a candidate for premier from its own ranks during the election, she replied: “Basically, no.”

The campaign kicks off formally on Wednesday.

Koike, 65, a former defense minister and ex-member of Abe’s LDP, said that all options were on the table regarding whom her party would back when parliament convenes to vote on a prime minister after the election.

“We need to see the results (of the election). We must protect this country and at the same time, we must change it,” Koike said.

“We will decide after the election after confirming the trend in which our Party of Hope can achieve this.”

In the interview with the Asahi, Koike praised former defense minister Shigeru Ishiba, whom she backed in a 2012 LDP leadership race won by Abe, and lauded Internal Affairs Minister Seiko Noda for her work on behalf of handicapped people.

Ishiba has criticized Abe on several fronts including his proposal to revise the constitution. Ishiba says Abe’s proposal does not go far enough.

Noda has said she wants to run in the next LDP leadership race when Abe’s term expires in September next year.

Koike said on Sunday her new party aims to offer voters a “middle of the fairway” choice, seeking to differentiate her group from the LDP and smaller, left-leaning opposition parties.

Among their policies, Koike’s Party of Hope has promised to freeze a planned 2019 sales tax hike and consider a new tax on companies’ retained earnings.

“If I use a golf course metaphor, right now, I believe we have right (wing parties) and left (wing parties) and nothing in between. So we will present ourselves as the fairway, the very center of the way,” Koike told a policy debate by major party leaders.

Koike said her party’s policies aim to bring a new idea such as basic income and will be closer to consumers.

The outlook for the election is foggy but some analysts say Koike’s party may be losing steam because it had too little time to prepare for the snap poll.