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Japan’s energy crisis, Covid-19 woes likely to eclipse LDP’s push to amend constitution
- Fresh off a major electoral win, the LDP now has the two-thirds majority in both houses the government needs to call a referendum on the constitution
- But more pressing issues like the rising costs of gas and food, a Covid-19 resurgence and an ageing population could determine Kishida’s legacy
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Japan’s efforts to amend its pacifist constitution might have received a boost following the landslide electoral victory of the ruling coalition after the assassination of former prime minister Shinzo Abe, analysts said.
But given the ongoing economic and social problems faced by the country, experts said it was uncertain if amending the constitution would rank highly on the agenda of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s administration.
Of the 125 seats that were contested in Sunday’s upper house election, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its smaller partner Komeito secured 76, with Kishida’s LDP winning 63, giving the ruling coalition a majority and total of 146 seats, including seats that are not up for grabs in the 248-member upper chamber of parliament.
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Last Friday, Abe, the country’s longest serving prime minister and LDP stalwart, was shot while giving a campaign speech in the western city of Nara and died of massive blood loss.
Michael Heazle, adjunct professor at the Griffith Asia Institute in Australia’s Griffith University, said it was hard to know exactly how much Abe’s assassination had influenced the outcome of the upper house election.
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Even before Abe’s assassination, the opposition remained in disarray and pre-election polling suggested that the government would win comfortably, Heazle said.
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