Tokyo (Jiji Press) — While Japan’s Diet has enacted a bill calling for decency in election campaign posters, the country’s efforts to prevent votes falling into chaos are starting to
Tokyo While Japan’s Diet has enacted a bill calling for decency in election campaign posters, the country’s efforts to prevent votes falling into chaos are starting to resemble a game of cat and mouse.
On Wednesday, the ruling and opposition camps put aside their differences for now to cooperate in enacting the bill to revise the public offices election law, drafted following the 2024 Tokyo gubernatorial poll, in which many inappropriate posters were seen.
Both sides hope to stop chaos from returning at the Tokyo metropolitan assembly election in June this year and this summer’s vote for the House of Councillors, the upper chamber of the country’s parliament.
While the revised law is expected to bring the poster issue to an end, new problems have popped up one after another.
In recent local elections, candidates with no intention of winning filed their candidacy just so that they could back another candidate. In addition, election-related disinformation and misinformation were rampant on social media.
“We’ll work to make sure that how the law has been revised is known widely to the public,” said Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi.
On the other issues, Hayashi said that all parties are treating them as key items on the agenda, adding that the government will closely watch further developments.
