JCP wins 5 seats

The Japanese Communist Party won five seats in the July 29 House of Councilors election in which 121 out of the 247 seats were up for election.

In the proportional representation constituency the JCP received about 4.33 million votes, an increase of 450,000 from the 1995 election and a decrease of 3.86 million from the 1998 election. The JCP secured four seats.

In the Tokyo constituency, JCP candidate Ogata Yasuo (JCP International Bureau director) was elected for a second six-year term.

Overall, the JCP lost three out of the eight seats it obtained in 1995.

Elected in the proportional representation constituency are Fudesaka Hideyo (JCP Policy Commission chair), Yoshikawa Haruko, Kami Tomoko, and Inoue Satoshi.

In the seven district constituencies in which JCP candidates were elected in 1998, the JCP was not able to secure its seats.

The JCP garnered more votes than in the 1995 election in all of the seven constituencies. In the three-seat Osaka Prefectural constituency, the JCP candidate received 594,063 votes and lost by a margin of only 8,250.

The Liberal Democratic Party won 65 seats and regained a majority of the seats which were up for election for the first time in nine years since 1992. In the ruling camp, the Komei Party secured 13 seats and the New Conservative Party won one seat, a decrease by two.

In the opposition front, the Democratic Party of Japan won 26, including four extra seats. The Liberal Party won three extra seats to secure six. The Social Democratic Party got three seats, a decrease of four.

The day after the election, JCP candidates took to the streets to express their commitment to what the JCP put forward during the campaign. (end)