{"id":1832,"date":"2025-07-20T07:40:43","date_gmt":"2025-07-20T07:40:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/07\/20\/japan-votes-in-election-seen-as-key-test-for-prime-minister-shigeru-ishiba\/"},"modified":"2025-07-20T07:40:43","modified_gmt":"2025-07-20T07:40:43","slug":"japan-votes-in-election-seen-as-key-test-for-prime-minister-shigeru-ishiba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/07\/20\/japan-votes-in-election-seen-as-key-test-for-prime-minister-shigeru-ishiba\/","title":{"rendered":"Japan votes in election seen as key test for Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Opinion polls suggest Ishiba\u2019s Liberal Democratic Party may fall short of a majority in Upper House elections.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Voters in Japan are going to the polls in an upper house election seen as a test of the popularity of Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and his ruling coalition.<\/p>\n

Polling stations opened nationwide at 7am on Sunday (22:00 GMT, Saturday) and will continue until 8pm (11:00 GMT) in most places, according to Japan\u2019s national broadcaster, NHK.<\/p>\n

The rising cost of living, especially for the staple food of rice, is a key issue for many voters, with population decline and foreign policy also on the agenda, according to NHK.<\/p>\n

Opinion polls suggest Ishiba\u2019s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and coalition partner Komeito may fall short of the 50 seats needed to retain control of the 248-seat upper house of parliament in an election where half of the seats are up for grabs.<\/p>\n

A poor performance on Sunday would not immediately trigger a change of government because the upper house lacks the power to file a no-confidence motion against a leader, but it would certainly deepen uncertainty over Ishiba\u2019s fate and Japan\u2019s political stability. Ishiba would face calls from within the LDP to resign or to find another coalition partner.<\/p>\n

\"a
Voters look at posters of candidates for the upper house election outside a polling station in Tokyo, Japan on Sunday [Manami Yamada\/Reuters]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Opinion polls also suggest smaller opposition parties pushing for tax cuts and increased public spending are set to gain. These parties include right-wing Sanseito, which is promising to curb immigration, oppose foreign capital inflows and reverse gender equality moves.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am attending graduate school, but there are no Japanese [people] around me. All of them are foreigners,\u201d said Yu Nagai, a 25-year-old student who said he voted for Sanseito.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I look at the way compensation and money are spent on foreigners, I think that Japanese people are a bit disrespected,\u201d Nagai told the Reuters news agency.<\/p>\n

Other voters, meanwhile, voiced concern about escalating xenophobia.<\/p>\n

Yuko Tsuji, a 43-year-old consultant, who came to a polling station inside a downtown Tokyo gymnasium with her husband, said they support the LDP for stability and unity and voted \u201cfor candidates who won\u2019t fuel division.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the ruling party doesn\u2019t govern properly, the conservative base will drift toward extremes. So I voted with the hope that the ruling party would tighten things up,\u201d she told The Associated Press news agency.<\/p>\n

Self-employed Daiichi Nasu, 57, said he hopes for a change towards a more inclusive and diverse society, with more open immigration and gender policies such as allowing married couples to keep separate surnames. \u201cThat\u2019s why I voted for the CDPJ,\u201d he said, referring to the opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan. \u201cI want to see progress on those fronts.\u201d<\/p>\n

More than 20 percent of registered voters, some 21 million people, voted early, significantly more than three years ago, NHK reported.<\/p>\n

Ishiba, 68, a self-avowed defence \u201cgeek\u201d and train enthusiast, became prime minister on his fifth attempt last September<\/a> before immediately calling snap elections for late October.<\/p>\n

Those polls marked a significant defeat<\/a> for the new prime minister\u2019s ruling coalition, which won just 209 seats in the lower house of parliament, down from the 279 it previously held.<\/p>\n

In April, Ishiba announced emergency economic measures<\/a> to alleviate any impact on industries and households affected by new tariffs imposed by the United States on Japanese exports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The country is still frantically seeking to secure a reprieve from US President Donald Trump\u2019s proposed 25 percent tariffs<\/a> before a new August 1 deadline touted by Washington.<\/p>\n

Ishiba\u2019s centre-right LDP has governed Japan almost continuously since 1955, albeit with frequent changes of leader.<\/p>\n

He is the third prime minister to lead the country since former leader Shinzo Abe<\/a> resigned in September 2020.<\/p>\n

Abe was assassinated two years later, leading to revelations and public outrage about ties<\/a> between the former prime minister, his LDP and the Unification Church.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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Source: <\/p>\n

Al Jazeera and news agencies<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opinion polls suggest Ishiba\u2019s Liberal Democratic Party may fall short of a majority in Upper House elections. Voters in Japan are going to the polls in an upper house election seen as a test of the popularity of Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and his ruling coalition. Polling stations opened nationwide at 7am on Sunday (22:00 … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1833,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1832","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1832","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1832"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1832\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}