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EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

Poll slump shows Abe’s vulnerability

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Linda Sieg -


ِAstunning defeat for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s ruling party at the hands of a novice political group in the capital has revealed the fragility of his support and shown that voters can desert him — if there is a credible alternative.


Abe surged back to power in 2012, pledging to revive the stale economy and bolster defence. He has led his ruling bloc to three more landslide victories in national polls since then.


But those victories were less robust than met the eye, since record or near-record low voter turnout allowed Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to rack up seats with support from a quarter or less of eligible voters.


On Sunday, the party got a chilling glimpse of just how vulnerable it could be if a viable opposition force emerges to attract unhappy voters.


Popular Governor Yuriko Koike’s novice Tokyo Citizens First party and its allies — including the LDP’s national-level coalition partner — won a landslide victory, taking 79 seats in Sunday’s election for the 127-member Tokyo Metropolitan assembly. The LDP got 23 seats, its worst-ever result in the capital and less than half its pre-vote presence.


The vote was a referendum on the first year in office of Koike, a media-savvy former LDP lawmaker and defence minister who defied the party’s old boy network to run on a reformist platform and become the first female governor of the metropolis.


But it was also a stinging rebuke to Abe’s administration, battered by suspicions of scandal over favouritism for a friend’s business and verbal gaffes by his cabinet ministers.


Worse than the scandals and missteps, however, was the perception among many voters that Abe and his powerful Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga have grown haughty and dismissive of criticism given the ruling bloc’s super-majorities in both houses of parliament, a weak and fragmented opposition and no serious challengers in his party.


“Arrogance, complacency, fragility” summed up a headline in the Nikkei business daily on Tuesday, ingredients politicians and pundits agreed were key causes of the LDP defeat.


“It doesn’t have anything to do with policy,” said Gerry Curtis, professor emeritus at New York’s Columbia University.


“It’s all about the arrogance of Abe and Suga and the sense that they are riding roughshod ... to break unstated rules of the game.”


The huge win for Koike has fanned speculation that her group will go national in a general election that must be held by late 2018, perhaps joining with disaffected lawmakers from the struggling opposition Democratic Party.


The Democrats, who have had little success in repairing their image after a rocky three-year reign ended in 2012, also fared badly in the Tokyo poll, taking only five seats.


A new party could set up Koike for a run at the nation’s top job, but her allies have said she’s unlikely to quit as governor to return to parliament before the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.


In the meantime, with much of Abe’s previous clout over his party based on his record of leading it to election wins, the dismal Tokyo showing could well encourage rivals to challenge his bid for a third term as LDP leader from September 2018. — Reuters


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