Lower house to be dissolved Tuesday for election, LDP in chaos

TOKYO, July 17 Kyodo -
Prime Minister Taro Aso decided Friday to dissolve the House of Representatives
on Tuesday for a general election, sending the ruling Liberal Democratic Party
into campaigning with internal divisions still unresolved.
Aso's decision came after the LDP leadership decided Friday to turn down
demands from some dissident lawmakers for a plenary meeting to sack the
unpopular Aso as LDP president and pick a new leader before the crucial
national election, which Aso has already said will take place Aug. 30.
LDP Secretary General Hiroyuki Hosoda announced in a news conference that the
party will hold a less formal meeting on Tuesday morning instead before the
lower house dissolution, giving Aso a chance to review the party's consecutive
losses in recent local elections and to declare his determination to fight the
upcoming national election before fellow party members.
''I understand that (party members) have a lot to say, and would like to sit
down and listen to them,'' Aso told reporters in the evening. ''Then, I will
offer them my opinions.''
He also indicated his determination in leading the election, saying,
''Contesting a general election in unity -- I believe that has been the Liberal
Democratic Party's tradition in its long history.''
''I have to stand at the forefront and fight the battle, even with my teeth
clenched,'' he added.
In tandem with the decision reached by the LDP leadership, the prime minister's
office notified Tadamori Oshima, chairman of the LDP's Diet Affairs Committee,
of Aso's plan to convene a Cabinet meeting at 8 a.m. Tuesday to endorse the
Diet dissolution.
The lower house's Steering Committee also decided Friday that the chamber's
plenary session will be convened at 1 p.m. Tuesday for the dissolution.
Speaking at the press conference, Hosoda said, ''I hear people saying, 'What
has the LDP been doing?''' and emphasized the need to strengthen the party's
fraying unity ahead of the election, in which analysts believe the LDP could
well lose to the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan.
The LDP's troubles have emboldened the opposition parties. DPJ Secretary
General Katsuya Okada told a separate press conference, ''I would like to say
to them, 'Get a grip.'''
''I'm worried that because of the turmoil in the ruling party, the people may
lose their interest and become disappointed in politics,'' he said.
But former LDP Secretary General Hidenao Nakagawa, one of the party's key rebel
lawmakers, was not satisfied with the leadership's decision and speculation is
simmering that he may derail Tuesday's party meeting by demanding again that
Aso be replaced.
''I repeatedly asked (Hosoda) to hold a formal plenary meeting, take time and
engage in thorough discussions,'' Nakagawa told reporters after meeting with
Hosoda on Friday morning.
''The LDP is for the people. In order to rejuvenate it, the president, who is
the top leader, needs to show his determination and passion (toward the
national election) and reflect on what has been done up to date,'' he said,
apparently referring to the party's crushing defeat in the Tokyo Metropolitan
Assembly election. ''If he cannot satisfy the party, he won't be able to
satisfy the people.''
''We won't give up yet,'' Nakagawa added.
An anti-Aso group led by Nakagawa submitted to the LDP leadership on Thursday
the signatures of what they claim is over one-third of the party's Diet
members, the minimum required to seek a Joint Plenary Meeting of Party Members
of Both Houses of the Diet, in which they could also call for holding a
presidential race to replace Aso.
But Masatoshi Wakabayashi, chairman of the joint plenary meeting who joined the
news conference with Hosoda, said, ''We concluded that the signatures don't
meet the one-third requirement'' with some lawmakers listed denying that they
ever offered their signatures and asking for their names to be removed.
The names of two members of Aso's Cabinet -- Finance Minister Kaoru Yosano and
Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Shigeru Ishiba -- appeared on the
list.
Both Yosano and Ishiba on Friday welcomed the party's decision to hold the
meeting next Tuesday.
''Apart from the name (of the meeting), it is satisfying to take an important
step,'' Yosano said at a separate press conference.
Ishiba said separately that the meeting must be ''a place to discuss what went
wrong,'' apparently referring to the consecutive local election losses.
In submitting the petition, the dissidents have voiced concern that the LDP
could suffer a severe setback if it campaigns for the lower house election
under Aso, following significant losses in the Tokyo election and other local
polls.
==Kyodo