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| Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike |
A stinging rebuke by voters in the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly
election Sunday is certain to set off postmortem finger-pointing and a
strategic recalibration within Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's ruling party
as he weighs a path forward for amending the constitution.
"We
take the results seriously," a stunned Liberal Democratic Party
Secretary-General Toshihiro Nikai told reporters Sunday night. "We will
reassess what needs to be reassessed and do our best to recover our lost
ground."
Tokyo
Gov. Yuriko Koike's new Tomin First no Kai party and groups aligned
with her captured 79 seats in the 127-member metropolitan assembly,
handily defeating the LDP, which was left with a meager 23 seats, down
from 57 before the election.
Hakubun Shimomura, who heads the
LDP's Tokyo chapter but faces allegations of receiving murky political
donations, attributed the party's loss to trouble on the national level.
"Heavy headwinds were blowing far above, in national politics," he said
in a Fuji Television program. He later told reporters that he plans to
step down to take responsibility for the loss.
Abe's party had
enjoyed unrivaled strength since unseating the Democratic Party of Japan
in December 2012, as victories in three national-level elections
followed. But a favoritism scandal involving a veterinary school run by a
friend of Abe's as well as a gaffe by his hawkish defense minister on
the campaign trail appear to have weakened public support.
Complications for Abe
In
a Nikkei opinion poll conducted June 16-18, right before the start of
campaigning for the metropolitan assembly election, approval ratings for
the Abe cabinet stood at 49%, a 7-point drop from a month
earlier. Abe's power inside the party could erode if his plunging
support is viewed as the cause of the devastating loss in the crucial
Tokyo vote.
Growing criticism within the party could complicate
Abe's plan for an easy victory in the LDP presidential election in
September 2018.
Shigeru Ishiba, a former regional revitalization
minister who is believed to harbor ambitions for Abe's job, gave a
scathing assessment. "We should acknowledge the historic defeat," he
told The Nikkei. "This was not a victory for Tomin First no Kai, but a
defeat for the LDP."
"Damage control is crucial," Ishiba added.
"The timing of a cabinet shake-up and the new lineup will determine the
future of government management going forward."
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