Japan Press Weekly

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2016 February 24 - March 1 [POLITICS]

5 opposition parties begin talks on electoral cooperation

Following the agreement by leaders of five opposition parties last week to jointly work to repeal the war legislation, Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Yamashita Yoshiki and his counterparts in four other parties on February 23 held their first meeting to discuss ways to implement the agreement.

In addition to JCP Yamashita, the meeting was attended by Edano Yukio of the Democratic Party of Japan, Imai Masato of the Japan Innovation Party, Mataichi Seiji of the Social Democratic Party, and Tamashiro Denny of the People’s Life Party.

At the meeting, the secretaries-general agreed that the five parties in their election platforms will pledge to work for the abolition of the war laws and the revocation of the Cabinet decision which lifted the ban on Japan’s use of the collective self-defense right.

Yamashita referred to the JCP proposal for establishing a “national coalition government to repeal the war legislation” and pointed out that as long as the five political parties cooperate in elections, they will be required to present an outline of a government they envisage. The five representatives consented to discuss how to explain this issue to the public.

The participants also agreed on the need to seek common ground on issues other than the war legislation, including the evaluation of the “Abenomics” economic policies, the planned consumption tax hike, the TPP free trade pact, and the plan to construct a new U.S. base in Okinawa.

The five parties will hold discussions once a week for the foreseeable future.