Official campaigning kicked off yesterday for the Tokyo metropolitan assembly election, seen as a bellwether for national trends..
Official campaigning kicked off yesterday for the Tokyo metropolitan assembly election, seen as a bellwether for national trends.
A total of 259 candidates will be vying for 127 seats in the election on July 2, which will pit the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) against rivals including the new party of Tokyo governor Yuriko Koike.
Ms Koike, 64, formerly of the LDP, is leading her new Tomin First no Kai (Tokyoites First) party into the contest, having been elected governor in a landslide win last year against an LDP candidate.
The Japanese media sees the contest as a barometer of the political fortunes of the popular Ms Koike, who is regarded as a potential premier and a threat to the LDP.
Yesterday, Ms Koike went on the offensive, pledging transparency and slamming what she described as the “black box” of LDP politics in the Tokyo assembly.
She told a rally in Shibuya: “We no longer want an old assembly that has been hiding things and with choices made to cover up.”
The LDP has been saddled with a scandal after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe allegedly pulled strings to help Kake Gakuen (Kake Educational Institution) , whose director Kotaro Kake is a friend, win approval for a veterinary school. The government has not green-lighted such schools for 52 years, given a glut of animal doctors.
Mr Abe’s approval ratings have fallen, and the national opposition is invoking a law that compels him to reopen the Diet so he can be questioned about the scandal.
