On January 23rd, Sanae Takaichi announced the dissolution of the House of Representatives, and on the evening of February 8th at 8 PM, a re-election vote was held for the Japanese House of Representatives. It was originally expected that this election would be similar to the last one, with the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) maintaining about half of the seats. However, when the vote counting began last night, the LDP’s seats suddenly surged. They quickly surpassed half, reaching 300 seats by dawn. When checking the final results in the morning, the LDP had 316 seats (already exceeding the 310 seats needed to amend the constitution), and the LDP coalition’s seats totaled 354, leaving the opposition parties with only 111 seats.
Currently, it appears that Japanese imperialism has already formed an absolute majority for the LDP in form, and the obstacles to amending the constitution and further fascistization in the National Diet have been eliminated. Coupled with Sanae Takaichi’s militarist rhetoric since taking office, and her mention during this House of Representatives election of normalizing Japan and establishing offensive forces, as well as actual actions such as building various new combat vessels and cooperating with the U.S. to introduce F-35 aircraft, it is clear what Japanese imperialism intends to do after this election.
In fact, the results of the House of Representatives election do not reflect any personal charisma of Takaichi, nor do they mean that the Japanese people support war. In capitalist countries, elections are ultimately controlled by the bourgeoisie. Not to mention that the voter turnout was only 55%, and the propaganda work before the election was even more extensive. Moreover, corruption and vote-buying by the bourgeoisie during elections are common. This is merely the Japanese monopolist bourgeoisie choosing the LDP to come to power to implement their will. In the current context of increasingly fierce contradictions between the two imperialist powers, the U.S. and China, this signals that Japan’s monopolist bourgeoisie is preparing for a new world war. It also indicates that a large amount of capital will be invested in supporting the military-industrial and heavy industry sectors of the LDP, accelerating military expansion and preparation. After this, Japan’s monopolist bourgeoisie may also use various methods, legal or illegal, to come to power and then eliminate legality, further establishing the brutal dictatorship of Japan’s monopolist bourgeoisie. To change all this, relying on so-called opposition parties is impossible; ultimately, it depends on the struggle of the working people.
