New Japan Law Calls for More Female Candidates in Elections

May 16, 2018

Tokyo- The Diet, Japan's parliament, enacted Wednesday a bill requesting political parties and organizations to even out the number of male and female candidates in public offices elections as much as possible.

The bill, aimed to encourage more women to advance into politics, became law as the House of Councillors, the upper chamber of the Diet, approved it at a plenary meeting. The bill cleared the House of Representatives, the lower chamber in April.

The law will be put into effect at the same time as its promulgation.

The lawmaker-initiated legislation stipulates that political parties and groups are obliged to make voluntary efforts, including setting goals for the numbers of both male and female candidates for public positions.

It also states that the central and local governments should also draw up necessary policy measures and work to implement them in order to equalize the number of candidates between men and women.

After the ruling and opposition parties reached an agreement on the handling of the bill in February last year, the bill was expected to be enacted during an ordinary session of the Diet in the same year.

The agreement, however, remained in limbo due to confrontation between the ruling and opposition parties over scandals, including favoritism allegations against the government over school operator Moritomo Gakuen, which was once linked to the wife of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Jiji Press