Photo/Illutration Tomoko Tamura becomes the first woman to head the Japanese Communist Party. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Can the Japanese Communist Party rejuvenate its public image and reverse its diminishing political presence and relevance with its first leadership change in 23 years?

To gain the support of a broader public, the JCP must carry out a wholesale and substantial reform of its organization and culture.

This is a critical juncture for the party in the 102nd year since its founding.

At its first party congress in four years, the JCP decided to replace long-serving chairman Kazuo Shii, who had been the “face of the party” since 2000, with Tomoko Tamura, the first female party head.

An Upper House member, Tamura served as a vice chair of the executive committee while also heading the JCP’s policy committee.

Tetsuzo Fuwa, a former chairman of the Central Committee and long-time ideological linchpin of the party, stepped down from the Central Committee, exiting the party leadership.

While Akira Koike, the chief of the party secretariat, retained his position, Tamura's successor as head of the policy committee was the youngest Diet member of the party, 39-year-old Upper House lawmaker Taku Yamazoe.

Shii, who is the chairman of the executive committee, has assumed the post of Central Committee chairman, which was long vacant after Fuwa retired from the position.

If Shii continues to wield real power in party operations, the personnel makeover may be seen as merely cosmetic.

Despite a generational shift in its executive team, the fact remains that the JCP’s path ahead is fraught with tough challenges.

The broad opposition cooperation formed in response to the controversial national security legislation forcefully enacted by the administration of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe initially had some success.

But the strategic move’s momentum waned in the last Lower House election three years ago.

The Democratic Party for the People and Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party) distanced themselves from the JCP, and its cooperative relationship with the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan also has clearly cooled.

The JCP's own strength has been on a steady decline. From a peak of about 500,000 members in 1990, the party membership has shrunk to 250,000 and aged considerably as well.

The circulation of the party's official newspaper, Shimbun Akahata (red flag newspaper), has more than halved over the past 20 or so years.

The party lost seats in both the Lower House election in 2021 and the Upper House poll in 2022, and suffered a historic defeat in last spring's unified local elections, losing a total of 135 seats.

This is a time when the party needs to broaden its political base beyond its traditional loyalists, particularly to win over younger voters.

However, the expulsion of a veteran member who advocated for electing the chairman by party member vote reinforced the JCP's image as a closed organization that does not tolerate dissenting voices.

At the party congress, a request for a re-examination of this expulsion was rejected, and Tamura rebuked a delegate who took exception to the decision during the discussion on the matter. 

She criticized the comment as indicating the speaker’s “lack of independence and sincerity as a party member.”

The resolution adopted at the congress included “upholding” of the traditional “democratic centralism,” which bans the forming of factions or any splinter groups within the party and requires party decisions to be unanimously followed.

The JCP has played an important role in exposing and righting the wrongs committed by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.

The Akahata newspaper blew the lid off on the scandal surrounding the political funding parties of the LDP factions. It also dug up the problem concerning how Abe used the tax-financed “cherry blossom viewing parties” for his personal benefit.

Tamura showed her political presence by pursuing this issue at the Diet.

To build up its power base by winning the sympathy and support of a broader range of citizens, the JCP must shed its overly defensive organizational posture and transform itself into an “open party.”

--The Asahi Shimbun, Jan. 19

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