November 19, 2021

Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Koike Akira on November 17 said that three candidates for the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan’s new leadership election highly evaluated the unified efforts of opposition parties in the October 31 general election.

Koike made this remark during the "BS Fuji LIVE PRIME NEWS" program aired on the day when refuting the program MC’s claim that whether to maintain the collaborative alliance with the JCP will be the point at issue in the coming CDPJ election for a new leader.

In response to his argument, Koike quoted recent comments on the opposition parties’ joint struggles by the three candidates (Izumi Kenta, Osaka Seiji, and Nishimura Chinami). Izumi commented that nationwide electoral cooperation between the CDPJ and the Democratic Party for the People, the Social Democratic Party, the Reiwa party, and the JCP accomplished a favorable result. Osaka in his comment said that it was important to adopt a strategy to challenge ruling bloc’s candidates to a one-on-one battle in the general election. Nishimura gave her view that the one-on-one battle strategy was vital to win in single-seat constituencies.

Koike said, “The teaming up of opposition parties produced an improved outcome. However, we failed to convince the electorate of our vision for a new government and the advantages of opposition parties’ electoral cooperation.” He expressed his determination to further advance cooperation among opposition parties based on lessons learned from the October general election.

Appearing with JCP Koike on the program, CDPJ vice head Nagatsuma Akira said, “The three candidates are well aware of the need for the opposition forces to field a joint candidate to defeat the ruling bloc candidate under the single-winner-take-all voting system. A clear consensus exists about the need to put up unified opposition candidates in all 32 single-seat constituencies in the House of Councilors election next summer.”