2 courts find 2017 Lower House poll constitutional

January 31, 2018

Akita/Tokyo- A Japanese high court and a high court branch on Tuesday dismissed claims by a group of lawyers that the October 2017 House of Representatives election, held with vote-value disparities of up to 1.98 times, was unconstitutional.

Sendai High Court's branch in the northeastern prefecture of Akita and Tokyo High Court respectively ruled that the Oct. 22 Lower House election was constitutional.

The verdicts were the second and the third among a total of 16 lawsuits filed with high courts and high court branches for invalidating the results of the closely watched election for the all-important lower chamber of the Diet, the country's parliament.

On Jan. 19, Fukuoka High Court's Naha branch in the southern prefecture of Okinawa also ruled that the general election was constitutional.

In the election, the most populated single-seat constituency was the No. 13 district of Tokyo, with about 472,000 voters, 1.98 times more than some 238,000 voters in the No. 1 district of Tottori Prefecture, western Japan, which was the least populated constituency.

The latest election was the first Lower House poll held with the maximum vote value disparity of under 2.0 times since the single-seat constituency system was introduced for the chamber in the 1990s.

In 2016, the Diet enacted legislation to reform the electoral system for the chamber, including the scrapping of one constituency in each of six prefectures, following the Supreme Court's judgment that the three previous Lower House elections were held in "a state of unconstitutionality."

Both of the day's verdicts said the Diet took steps to reduce the vote-value disparities in accordance with the top court rulings. The Tokyo court said the disparities are expected to shrink further after the planned introduction of the so-called Adams' method for seat allocation, which better reflects differences in populations.

Rulings on the other 13 lawsuits will be given by March, and the Supreme Court is expected to issue a unified judgment by the end of this year. Jiji Press