Japanese PM Abe calls for snap elections amid N Korea crisis
TOKYO: Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday called a snap election, seeking a fresh term at the helm of the world’s third-largest economy as tensions with nearby North Korea reach fever pitch.
Abe hopes to capitalise on a weak and fractured opposition to sweep back into power, as polls show him regaining ground after a series of scandals.
“I will dissolve the House of Representatives on the 28th” of September, Abe told reporters, a precursor to a general election. The prime minister did not give a date for the election but it will reportedly be on October 22.
Surveys suggest voters approve of the hardline stance taken by the nationalist Abe on North Korea, which fired two missiles over the country in the space of a month and has threatened to “sink” Japan.
According to a weekend poll in business daily Nikkei, 44% voters plan to vote for Abe’s conservative LDP party, while only 8% said they would side with the opposition Democratic Party.
Nevertheless, one fifth of those polled said they were still undecided, potentially opening the door for gains by a new party formed by allies of the popular Tokyo mayor Yuriko Koike.
Koike’s Tomin First no Kai (Tokyo Residents First) party humiliated Abe and the LDP in local elections in July, but analysts say the new grouping has not had time to lay national foundations to mount a serious challenge to the prime minister.
“There is no opposition worthy of the name in Japan. The LDP is a giant among dwarves. It would take a major scandal to derail the Abe express,” said Jeff Kingston, Director of Asian Studies at Temple University, Japan.
The winner of the expected snap election faces a daunting in-tray of challenges ranging from an unprecedented crisis with North Korea to reviving the once world-beating Japanese economy.
Despite a recent run of growth, the election winner will also have to contend with a sluggish economy, as the heavily indebted country grapples with low birthrates and a shrinking labour force.