By YUTA OGI/ Staff Writer
October 20, 2024 at 19:03 JST
Ground Self-Defense Force members during a training exercise in Kagoshima Prefecture in 2019 (Asahi Shimbun file photo)
A large majority of Komeito candidates in the Lower House election support revisions to the Constitution, but they have different priorities from their coalition counterparts in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, a survey found.
Only 8 percent of those pro-revision candidates from the peace-oriented party said the Constitution needs to be amended to specify the Self-Defense Forces, an issue that resonates with 97 percent of like-minded LDP candidates.
The LDP has called for including the SDF in war-renouncing Article 9 to clearly state its constitutionality.
A survey by The Asahi Shimbun and Masaki Taniguchi, a political science professor at the University of Tokyo, asked candidates running in the Oct. 27 Lower House election to state whether they think there is a need to change the Constitution.
The respondents were given five choices, including no opinion.
Seventy-eight percent of Komeito candidates selected “there is a need” or “there is a need, if I had to pick one,” up from 51 percent in the previous election in 2021.
Among LDP candidates, 98 percent picked one of those answers.
In addition, 98 percent of candidates from Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party) and 93 percent of candidates from the Democratic Party for the People supported constitutional revision.
In contrast, 63 percent of candidates from the largest opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan selected “there isn’t any need” or “there isn’t any need, if I had to pick one.”
Among candidates from Reiwa Shinsengumi, 93 percent chose one of those answers.
All candidates from the Japanese Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party were in favor of not amending the Constitution.
Those who supported amendments were also asked to pick all issues for which they think changes are necessary.
For example, a revision to allow an extension of the term of office for Diet members during an emergency attracted support from 70 percent of pro-revision LDP candidates and 77 percent of like-minded Komeito candidates.
Forty-two percent of LDP candidates backed a revision to allow the government to establish an ordinance without Diet debate during an emergency, which anti-revision opposition parties assert could give the state power to restrict people’s rights.
But no Komeito candidates supported this revision.
Sixty-seven percent of Komeito candidates backed a revision on privacy rights, compared with only 11 percent of LDP candidates.
Among pro-revision Nippon Ishin candidates, 94 percent, the largest percentage, chose specifying the SDF in the Constitution.
In the DPP, the revision to extend the term of office for Diet members during an emergency was the top priority, selected by 65 percent of its pro-revision candidates.
A proposal to revise the Constitution needs to be approved by two-thirds or more of all members of both houses of the Diet. Pro-revision parties need to agree on specific issues before any proposal is submitted.
After being approved by the Diet chambers, a proposal needs to win a majority in a national referendum.
The survey received 1,233 replies, representing 91.7 percent of the 1,344 Lower House election candidates, by the afternoon of Oct. 17.
Here is a collection of first-hand accounts by “hibakusha” atomic bomb survivors.
A peek through the music industry’s curtain at the producers who harnessed social media to help their idols go global.
Cooking experts, chefs and others involved in the field of food introduce their special recipes intertwined with their paths in life.
A series based on diplomatic documents declassified by Japan’s Foreign Ministry
A series about Japanese-Americans and their memories of World War II
