The Upper House election campaigns are being held fiercely, contesting on the issues of the Constitution, consumption tax, pensions and nuclear power generation. Five days are left ahead of the voting day, July 21. If the constitution-supporting opposition bloc wins, we can prevent the Abe administration from surviving longer and thus we can transform our society into one in which the constitutional rules thrive. Let’s make the best during the days before balloting.

LET’S END INTENT OF CONSTITUTION AMENDMENT OF ABE GOVERNMENT

Make utmost efforts!

The election campaign has ushered in the final stage. The New Socialist Party makes the best, working in the constitutional opposition coalition in order to change the politics of the Abe government as well as to wedge its revision plot of the war-renouncing constitution. It is the crucial phase. Let’s make the maximum and ultimate efforts to block the government’s moves to rewrite the supreme law.

The April local elections have shown that the Abe government failed to win trust of people.

(1)        anti-Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) candidates won in the governor’s election in Okinawa and in the by-elections of the House of Representatives,

(2)        the Osaka Ishin-no-kai’s candidates won overwhelmingly, defeating the ruling LDP’s candidates in Osaka and,

(3)        opinion surveys indicate that dissatisfactions with the Abe government are deep-rooted as is seen in a fact people clearly oppose rather than they are in favor of all of individual policy issues.

The Abe government has enjoyed the majority in the Diet in a steady way: it is mainly because it has been a beneficiary from the small constituency election system, as is said broadly, and been saved by people’s disillusionment in the former government led by the Democratic Party. Under these circumstances the Abe administration has led the economy to a realm of high stock market and cheap-Yen by way of the financial deregulation measures, which has ostensibly produced good recovery of business activities. It has engaged in the government-led labor offensives and proposed a policy of free-of-charge pre-school education. These steps have dazzled people.

Many of the citizens have felt deceitful, but they do ‘not have an alternative’, by which the government has survived for six and a half years.

Consequences of the Abe politics

Indeed dissatisfactions are accumulated as if they should blow up like magma. According to a survey conducted by the NHK, a public broadcasting company, before the April elections, 91% of people feel uneasy about the on-going aging society, 91% on the pension programs, and 88% on accountability of politicians. Another opinion researches made by the mass media corporations before the July election campaigns show, too, people are concerned about the consumption tax and economic boost as well as daily livelihood.

Thirty years ago, when the imperial era Heisei began, Japan was called a nation of 100 million medium-class inhabitants. In July 2006, however, the OECD pointed out that the country is abnormally filled with social gaps, warning that its relative poverty rate follows closely that of the United States, which is worst of all the developed countries. Especially the poverty rate of families with children has exceeded that of the US and as for the relative poverty rate of single parent families has stood out that of the United States.

Let’s break with Abe politics

Social gaps and poverty spread. Domestic demands shrink. A birth-rate falls, though the government estimated a third generation of baby boomers would come. Population decreases and state finance is in crisis. These facts are the major causes of anxiety on the future. Every one of these evils stems from a rapid increase of irregular employment practices urged by the deregulation policies imposed on the labor market.

Difficulties that Japan face today are consequences of the neo-liberal politics of the ruling bloc of the LDP and the Komeito has launched. The only way to save the nation is to break with the Abe politics. Let’s end the neo-liberal policies.

It is the final phase of the election campaigns. Let’s do everything in our power.

July 16, 2019