April 13, 2013
The Abe Cabinet on April 12 submitted to the House of Representatives a bill to revise the Public Offices Election Law to reduce the number of single-seat districts in defiance of court recognitions of vote-value disparity in single-seat districts in the 2012 general election as unconstitutional and invalid.
The ruling Liberal Democratic and Komei parties intend to pass the bill during the current Diet session that will end on June 26.
The bill aims to cut one single-seat constituency each in the five prefectures of Fukui, Yamanashi, Tokushima, Kochi, and Saga, and redraw the single-seat zoning of 42 electoral districts in 17 prefectures, including Tokyo.
Even if the bill is implemented, the vote-value gap between the least and most populous constituencies will only be narrowed to 1.998 from the current 2.524. The government measure falls far short of realizing “equality in vote weight” which is required by the Japanese Constitution.
In a series of 16 vote-value disparity lawsuits, all 16 court decisions declared that wide vote disparity in the 2012 election was unconstitutional, and two of the courts went so far as to invalidate the single-seat blocs’ election results.
The Japanese Communist Party has proposed that all Lower House members be chosen from 11 proportional representation blocs so that the vote-value disparity can be immediately decreased to 1.03.
Related past article:
> Courts rule vote-value disparities in latest general election unconstitutional [March 28,2013]
The ruling Liberal Democratic and Komei parties intend to pass the bill during the current Diet session that will end on June 26.
The bill aims to cut one single-seat constituency each in the five prefectures of Fukui, Yamanashi, Tokushima, Kochi, and Saga, and redraw the single-seat zoning of 42 electoral districts in 17 prefectures, including Tokyo.
Even if the bill is implemented, the vote-value gap between the least and most populous constituencies will only be narrowed to 1.998 from the current 2.524. The government measure falls far short of realizing “equality in vote weight” which is required by the Japanese Constitution.
In a series of 16 vote-value disparity lawsuits, all 16 court decisions declared that wide vote disparity in the 2012 election was unconstitutional, and two of the courts went so far as to invalidate the single-seat blocs’ election results.
The Japanese Communist Party has proposed that all Lower House members be chosen from 11 proportional representation blocs so that the vote-value disparity can be immediately decreased to 1.03.
Related past article:
> Courts rule vote-value disparities in latest general election unconstitutional [March 28,2013]
