Photo/Illutration Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, left front, listens as Yoshihiko Noda, leader of the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, asks questions during a Diet session on Oct. 9. (Koichi Ueda)

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba on Oct. 9 dissolved the Lower House, setting up a snap election for Oct. 27.

An extraordinary Cabinet meeting will be held at the prime minister’s office on the evening of Oct. 9 to officially decide the election schedule. The campaign for the election is expected to start on Oct. 15.

The dissolution of the Lower House came eight days after Ishiba took over as prime minister on Oct. 1.

The 26-day interval between his inauguration and the election will be the shortest in the postwar period.

The election will give voters a chance to voice their opinions about the funding scandal in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, the new Ishiba administration, and the policies of opposition parties.

In October 2021, the LDP and junior coalition partner Komeito won more than 290 seats in the Lower House, well over the majority.

Earlier in the day, the LDP announced its list of 279 candidates who will receive party endorsements for the election.

The number of non-endorsed candidates due to the funding scandal is now 12, including Lower House member Ichiro Kanke and former LDP policy chief Koichi Hagiuda.

According to a senior LDP official, if these non-endorsed members run as independents in the election, the LDP will not field opposing candidates.

During the party leaders debate in the Diet, Yoshihiko Noda, president of the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, pressed Ishiba for his apparent leniency toward those involved in the fund scandal.

“Most of them will be endorsed. Endorsement means giving them a stamp of approval,” Noda said. “Hard-earned taxpayer money may be spent on those who have committed borderline tax evasion.”

Ishiba countered: “You make presumptions that a slush fund was created. And no one has been charged with tax evasion. It is a blanket assumption to call it tax evasion.”

Nobuyuki Baba, leader of Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Innovation Party), asked Ishiba, “What does this dissolution of the Lower House ask of the people?”

Ishiba replied, “It is a fact that a new Cabinet has been formed.”

He said the snap election will “ask for the people’s confidence in what we are trying to do as an administration.”

Baba also accused Ishiba of backtracking on the plans he expressed in the LDP presidential election.

“You said you would not dissolve the (Lower House) immediately and that you wanted to hold a budget committee meeting to discuss domestic and foreign issues,” Baba said. “You said many things, such as creating an Asian version of NATO.

“But as soon as you became prime minister, these things dissipated.”

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