Photo/Illutration The Diet building (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

At risk of losing a majority in the Lower House, 57 percent of Liberal Democratic Party candidates are open to forming a coalition with the opposition Democratic Party for the People, a survey showed.

Forty-eight percent of the LDP candidates said a coalition could be formed with Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party).

Opinion polls indicate the current ruling coalition of the LDP and junior partner Komeito is in danger of falling short of a majority in the Oct. 27 Lower House election.

In a joint survey conducted by The Asahi Shimbun and Masaki Taniguchi, a political science professor at the University of Tokyo, candidates were given three choices about forming a coalition with various parties: should form coalition regardless of election outcome; could form coalition depending on election results; and coalition is impossible regardless of election outcome.

Komeito candidates took a sharply different view from the LDP candidates about possible partners.

Ninety-six percent of Komeito candidates said a coalition with Nippon Ishin was impossible. And only 33 percent of them said one with the DPP was possible, while 67 percent said it was impossible.

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who heads the LDP, did not respond to the survey.

Keiichi Ishii, the Komeito leader, responded that his party could never form a coalition with the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, Nippon Ishin or the Japanese Communist Party. He gave no response regarding a possible coalition with the DPP.

Fifty-six percent of DPP candidates said a coalition with the LDP could or should be formed, while 79 percent said a coalition with the CDP could or should be formed. The same ratio, 79 percent, said a coalition with Nippon Ishin was possible.

Despite all the clamor for a DPP partnership, the party’s leader, Yuichiro Tamaki, responded that it was impossible to form a coalition with any party.

Nippon Ishin candidates were also largely against forming coalitions, with 82 percent saying one with the LDP was impossible, 85 percent saying one with Komeito was impossible, and 83 percent saying one with the CDP was impossible.

Nippon Ishin leader Nobuyuki Baba also said a coalition with those parties was impossible.

Ninety-five percent of CDP candidates said a coalition with the DPP could or should be formed. Sixty percent of CDP candidates said a coalition with Nippon Ishin was possible, exceeding the 40 percent that said it was impossible.

But 72 percent said a coalition with the JCP was impossible.

CDP President Yoshihiko Noda said coalitions with the LDP, Komeito and the JCP were impossible, but coalitions with Nippon Ishin and the DPP were possible.

Seventy-two percent of JCP candidates said a coalition with the CDP was possible. Although JCP leader Tomoko Tamura said coalitions with the LDP, Komeito, Nippon Ishin and DPP were impossible, she gave no response regarding one with the CDP.

Questionnaires were mailed to all 1,344 candidates. Valid responses were received from 1,245 individuals by the morning of Oct. 21.

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