DPJ defeated, coalition loses its majority in Upper House

Voters gave failing marks to the Democratic Party of Japan for its first 10 months of governing in Sunday's Upper House election.

Early returns and exit polls by The Asahi Shimbun indicated the DPJ would fall short of the minimum 54 seats set by Prime Minister Naoto Kan as his goal in the poll.

The opposition Liberal Democratic Party was heading toward picking up more seats than the DPJ among the 121 that were up for grabs.

Exit polls showed that the LDP could end up winning as many as 50 seats, while the DPJ looked set to claim no more than 47 seats. It won 50 seats in the election six years ago.

Kan told a close associate Sunday night that regardless of the outcome he would remain in office to carry out his goals of fixing the nation's fiscal mess and putting new life in the economy.

Kan's apparent readiness before the official start of the Upper House campaign to go along with an LDP proposal to raise the consumption tax rate from the current 5 percent was seen as a key reason for the public backlash against the DPJ.

The outcome will prevent the DPJ-led ruling coalition from gaining a majority in the Upper House, heralding even more difficulties for the Kan administration in the months to come.

Sunday's results were in sharp contrast to last August when the DPJ won a historic Lower House election that put the party in control of government for the first time and ended near-uninterrupted rule by the LDP over five decades.

While the Upper House setback will not immediately translate into another change of government, the results do show that the DPJ has effectively used up most of the goodwill entrusted to it by voters last August.

Exit polls indicated that the LDP was doing especially well in the single-seat prefectural constituencies. The outcome in the 29 single-seat districts has heavily influenced overall results in past Upper House elections because those districts most often pit the two major parties against each other.

The DPJ appeared to be struggling to win even 10 of the single-seat districts.

That is in sharp contrast to three years ago when the DPJ and its allies dealt the then ruling LDP a humiliating defeat in the Upper House election, winning 23 of the 29 single-seat districts.

In the 2001 Upper House election held soon after Junichiro Koizumi became prime minister, the LDP camp won 25 of the then 27 single-seat districts.

The LDP's comeback on Sunday means that Sadakazu Tanigaki will not be challenged immediately for the party presidency. He had promised before the Upper House election to step down if the coalition gained a majority in the chamber.

Tanigaki on Sunday night thanked voters for their judgment on two points, "the meandering governing of the DPJ and whether the LDP had changed" after its historic loss last August.

One consolation for the DPJ was that it appeared headed toward gaining more votes in the nationwide proportional representation segment. However, the marginal lead in seats the party will have over the LDP would be insufficient to counter the disadvantage in the prefectural constituencies.

The opposition Your Party also did well Sunday. It was set to pick up close to 10 seats, most through the proportional representation constituency.

Another opposition party, New Komeito, was also heading toward winning 10 seats.

The junior coalition partner People's New Party was struggling to win a single seat.

Mizuho Fukushima, head of the Social Democratic Party, retained her Upper House seat even though her party left the coalition after Fukushima was dismissed from the Cabinet of Yukio Hatoyama for opposing the government position on relocating the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in Okinawa Prefecture.

With the ruling coalition falling to a minority in the Upper House, Kan will have to seek out new coalition partners to obtain a working majority. It remains to be seen whether any party would be willing to join a DPJ that has been effectively rejected by voters.

Yoshimi Watanabe, the leader of Your Party, repeatedly said during the Upper House campaign that his party would never join hands with the DPJ.

New Komeito head Natsuo Yamaguchi also maintained a confrontational stance toward the DPJ throughout the campaign.

The woeful outcome could also stir problems for Kan within his own party. With a party presidential election scheduled for September, lawmakers thinking about their own political futures could start angling for a new party president to lead them into the next Lower House election, which must be held within three years. Some will likely blame Kan's comment about the consumption tax rate for the party's mauling.

DPJ lawmakers loyal to former Secretary-General Ichiro Ozawa will likely not sit still, either, especially since Kan made party executive and Cabinet picks that were designed to reduce Ozawa's influence in the DPJ.

One early victim may be Yukio Edano, the current secretary-general. In his post, he would be held responsible for the party's miserable electoral showing and calls may arise for his replacement.

However, Kan would not want to give the impression that he was bending to pressure from the Ozawa camp and he could retain Edano in his seat. That could lead to a bruising fight for the party presidency in September.