politics

LDP to back Koike for re-election in Tokyo gubernatorial election

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Surely there must be a much better candidate that is willing to step up.

11 ( +11 / -0 )

So the story continues. She started a party to pull away electable candidates from the only party able to stand a chance against the LDP a few years back and then went on to torpedo the party before the election. At the time I said she would be paid back by the LDP for her deeds of collusion and here is a taste of that payback. She is as dirty as they come. This is democracy in Nippon.

13 ( +13 / -0 )

no democracy.

10 ( +10 / -0 )

J-DakeT:

[S]he would be paid back by the LDP for her deeds of collusion...

It is quite simple to understand why LDP may support Koike. But it's not due to what you think.

First of all, there are many within LDP, who are strongly opposed to Koike. There have been anti-Koike voices for all these years since she became the Tokyo governor, and those voices were almost always from the supporters of the most conservative, right wing of the Party.

If you read original articles and news (Yomiuri, NHK) concerning this report, the purpose of the meeting is an attempt to contain those oppositions within the party. And at this point, we are still not sure if LDP leadership can really contain those oppositions. Even within the LDP leadership, the support for Koike is not uniform, not even majority.

Why then LDP is about to endorse Koike?

FACT 1: Koike is politically conservative - all her life. Despite strong oppositions within the party, she ran for the governor as a member of LDP. Remember? She ran the race as a LDP member, splitting the party supporters to have two candidates and even remained so for some time even after becoming the Tokyo governor. In her speech during the race, she often explained her economic policies as "actualizing Abenomics from Tokyo". She never wanted to leave the party. She was kicked out by the oppositions within the party.

FACT 2: The oppositions within the LDP have so far failed to find a viable candidate of their own. It's not due to a lack of effort by the oppositions within LDP that they still do not have a candidate to run against Koike. They've announced their intent to defeat Koike in the next election, repeatedly since last year until very recently. They simply came up empty handed. They really, really want a LDP candidate to defeat Koike but they have none. This is largely due to a fact that Koike remains popular among both conservative and liberal voters despite her failure in an unpopular attempt to create a new national party.

FACT 3: The opposition parties have announced to endorse a candidate to run against Koike. About a week ago, several opposition parties, including Constitutional Democratic Party, National Democratic Party, Social Democratic Party and Communist Party, have met and announced their decision to find a single candidate to run against Koike. This announcement pushed the LDP leadership to endorse Koike. If LDP runs against Koike, it will split conservative and centrist voters, benefiting the leftist candidate - that would be absolutely a nightmare for LDP.

It's no-brainer that LDP leadership wants to contain the oppositions within.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

She could not even take a good steps to prevent COVID19.

Actually they're worried about economy not about citizen.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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