Tough battle brews as campaigning for Japan's election kicks off

Ruling LDP, coalition partner face struggle to hold on to majority in Lower House

- Walter Sim

TOKYO – Will Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its coalition partner Komeito manage to hold on to their majority in the Lower House?

That looks to be the biggest question as official campaigning kicked off on Oct 15 for a snap election on Oct 27, a year ahead of the expiry of lawmaker terms. At stake are 465 seats in the powerful Lower Chamber of Japan's bicameral Diet, as its Parliament is known.

Several pollsters have forecast a hung Parliament, which would be a stunning repudiation of Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's one-month-old government, formed on Oct 1 after he beat out eight other candidates in a bruising LDP leadership race that exposed ideological chasms in the party.

Mr Ishiba, 67, is now seeking a public mandate, but he has acknowledged that the contest will be an "extremely tough" one. He has set a goal for the LDP-Komeito bloc to win a simple majority of 233 seats – down from the 279 that the two parties held in the now-dissolved chamber – after a damaging slush fund scandal.

Following in the footsteps of his predecessors, Mr Ishiba flagged off his campaign in Fukushima on Oct 15 - a sign of how important the region's recovery is for Japan after the devastating 2011 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster.

Lawmakers implicated in the slush fund scandal were found to have wilfully kept money off the books, and the controversy has stoked distrust among a public that is reeling from the rising cost of living, and many remain dissatisfied with the LDP's handling of the affair.

"The LDP is heading into this election with deep remorse (over our improprieties). This will be an election to revive Japan – I will create a new Japan," Mr Ishiba said.