October 16, 2024

The campaign period for the general election slated for October 27 officially began on October 15. Candidates of the Japanese Communist Party for proportional representation and single-seat constituencies made their first campaign street speeches at many locations across the country with the party leadership, including Central Committee Chair Shii Kazuo, Executive Committee Chair Tamura Tomoko, and Secretariat Head Koike Akira, in the lead.

JCP EC Chair Tamura, speaking near Tokyo’s Ikebukuro Station, criticized Prime Minister Ishiba Shigeru for holding the general election only two weeks after the inauguration of the new government. She said, “The Liberal Democratic Party changed its president but nothing will change in the LDP. It is already clear that he is simply taking over the LDP’s deadlocked policies.”

Tamura stated, “The JCP has firm policies that will help overcome LDP politics.” She called on the entire party to demonstrate all its grassroots power and the strength of its ties with concerned citizens nationwide in order to win a JCP breakthrough in proportional representation blocs.

In her speech, Tamura explained that a JCP advance will lead to sweeping away corruption in politics, opening up hope for people’s daily lives, and building peace without fear of war.

Regarding the LDP slush-fund scandal, Tamura stressed that it was the Akahata Sunday edition that exposed the allegations of off-the-book moneymaking within LDP factions, and that it was the JCP Dietmembers who pressed for LDP responsibility for this organized crime. She criticized PM Ishiba for continuing to downplay the issue by claiming that it was not an “organized” crime.

On the topic of people’s livelihoods and the country’s economy, Tamura said that the JCP has a concrete measure to increase the minimum hourly wage to more than 1,500 yen, and presented the party proposal to levy a tax on large corporations’ internal reserves to fund government measures needed to sufficiently support pay hikes at small- and medium-sized enterprises.

Noting that the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations (Nihon Hidankyo) won the Nobel Peace Prize, Tamura criticized PM Ishiba for asserting that “Japan is surrounded by nuclear powers and needs the ‘nuclear deterrence’ capability of the United States.” She said, “It is unacceptable for the prime minister of the only A-bombed country to affirm nuclear armament,” and that the JCP is firmly opposed to the “nuclear deterrence” doctrine and the strengthening of the Japan-U.S. military alliance. She called for a major advance of the JCP, the party advocating Japan’s ratification of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.