Takeshita Faction Members to Freely Vote in LDP Election

August 9, 2018

Tokyo- Wataru Takeshita, senior official at Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party, said Thursday members of his faction will make independent judgments about who to vote for in the party's presidential election in September.

Takeshita, chairman of the LDP's General Council, said he wanted to form a consensus within his faction, which has 55 members and is the third largest in the party, about which candidate to support, but failed to do so.

While many of the faction's House of Representatives members are expected to vote for the incumbent LDP president, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, a majority of the House of Councillors members of the faction are believed to support former LDP Secretary-General Shigeru Ishiba.

Speaking at a meeting of his faction, which has 20 members, on Thursday, Ishiba expressed his intention to announce his candidacy in the presidential election on Friday.

He is expected to clarify his policies related to constitutional amendment, national security and party management.

A faction led by Nobuteru Ishihara, former LDP secretary-general, decided Thursday that its members, totaling 12, will vote for Abe to help him win a third consecutive term as the party's president.

Abe has now clinched support from over 60 pct of the LDP's 405 lawmakers, including 94 members of the party's largest faction led by former LDP Secretary-General Hiroyuki Hosoda, to which the prime minister has belonged.

In addition, about 70 pct of LDP lawmakers who do not belong to any intraparty faction are seen as ready to vote for Abe. Jiji Press