Lower House meeting set today on breakup for election

September 27, 2017

TOKYO- The chairman of the Japanese House of Representatives steering committee decided on Tuesday to hold a plenary meeting of the lower chamber of parliament on Thursday to allow Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to break up the chamber for a snap election.

The decision by Tsutomu Sato, chairman of the Lower House Committee on Rules and Administration, was made at an executive meeting of the panel, after representatives from the main opposition Democratic Party and the Japanese Communist Party walked out.

The opposition parties are resisting Abe's plan to dissolve the Lower House at the beginning of an extraordinary parliamentary session set to begin on Thursday.

They are accusing the prime minister of trying to avoid parliamentary debate on his government's high-profile favoritism scandals by dissolving the Lower House.

"We can't imagine worse timing for a (Lower House) dissolution," DP leader Seiji Maehara said at a party executive meeting.

During the Lower House committee meeting, the ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito rejected the DP's demand to adopt a resolution condemning North Korea's nuclear and missile development at a Lower House plenary meeting.

The ruling bloc initially planned to adopt such a resolution at the beginning of the extraordinary session, but it apparently changed the plan in the wake of Abe's snap election decision this month.

On the assumption of its victory in the general election, expected to take place on Oct. 22, the ruling bloc is considering a special parliamentary session to be convened on or around Oct. 31 to elect the prime minister, informed sources said Tuesday.

The special session would likely be held for around three days, ahead of the first Japan visit by US President Donald Trump, planned for early November.

The ruling coalition is also considering holding an extraordinary parliamentary session from as early as Nov. 16, following Abe's planned visit to Vietnam and the Philippines earlier in the month. Jiji Press