Tokyo Vote Repudiates Ruling Party : Landslide for Foes Deepens Crisis for Embattled Premier

Voters in the Japanese capital repudiated the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and overwhelmingly supported the opposition in Sunday’s strategic Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly election, sending a bold message to Japan’s leaders that is likely to hasten the fall of Prime Minister Sosuke Uno and set the stage for a growing crisis in national politics.

Unofficial final results reported today by NHK, the quasi-public television network, showed opposition candidates winning 85 of the 128 assembly seats, while the ruling party kept only 43 of the 63 seats it held in the old assembly. The big winner was the Japan Socialist Party, which nearly tripled its strength by taking 29 seats.

In an apparent sign of discontent, voter turnout was exceptionally high--especially among women voters believed to be outraged over recent allegations that Uno, 66, engaged in extramarital affairs, as well as resentful about a new consumption tax that has cut into their pocketbooks.

Although they have a perennial chokehold on Parliament, the Liberal Democrats did not control a majority of seats in the Tokyo assembly. But the embarrassing setback was expected to contribute to pressures on Uno to resign before the economic summit in Paris beginning July 14, and it could presage a disaster for the conservatives in the July 23 upper house election, political analysts said.

Despite intermittent rain, voter turnout was 58.7%, more than 5 percentage points higher than the previous election three years ago. For women, the turnout was 61.3%, a wide differential not ordinarily seen in Japanese elections. A record 33 women were among the 246 candidates, and 10 of them had been confirmed elected in early returns, an achievement in the male-dominated electoral arena.

New Role for Women

The election may well signal the arrival of a new and powerful role for women in Japanese politics, in line with what the Japanese media have dubbed the “madonna strategy” of the Socialist Party. Following a devastating defeat in the 1986 Parliamentary election, the Socialists chose a woman--constitutional scholar Takako Doi--as their leader and aggressively recruited women volunteers and supporters to rebuild the party at the grass-roots level.

For the conservatives, who held 63 seats going into Sunday’s election, the poor showing fell far short of most worst-case scenarios. Party leaders had hoped to contain their losses and hold on to a plurality of at least 50 seats.

Public confidence in the Liberal Democratic Party has eroded steadily for the last year since an insider-trading and influence-peddling scandal surfaced, casting grave suspicions on political ethics.

The Recruit Co. case, one of the largest scandals in postwar Japan, resulted in the bribery indictments of two members of Parliament and the arrest of 13 businessmen and government officials. It also forced Uno’s predecessor, Noboru Takeshita, to resign because of his financial ties to Recruit Co.

The ruling party had attempted to shore up support by promising to enact political reforms. It cast Uno, who served as Takeshita’s foreign minister, in a “Mr. Clean” role--he being one of the few party leaders untainted by the Recruit scandal.

But the prime minister’s image unraveled soon after he took office in early June when press reports began circulating that he had a brief liaison four years ago with a geisha--a traditional hostess but not necessarily a prostitute. More allegations followed that Uno engaged in extramarital paid sex, culminating in reports last week that Uno had an affair with an underaged apprentice geisha.

Uno has declined to comment publicly about any of the specific allegations, but last month he told Parliament: “I have not done anything unethical. I have never despised or insulted women. Particularly in this day of equality of the sexes, I always respect women.”

However, Japanese newspapers reported that Uno was on the verge of a mental breakdown last Tuesday night because of the adverse publicity and had attempted to resign his post rather than risk humiliation at the Paris summit of the seven industrial powers. Party leaders reportedly persuaded Uno to stay on until after the annual summit. Japan has been taking a greater leadership role at the summit in recent years, commensurate with its status as an economic power.

But party elders, including some former prime ministers, have called on Uno to step down immediately.

No Ready Replacement

Who would replace him, however, is a difficult question. For months, Takeshita had resisted demands that he quit--largely, it is believed, because a suitable successor was not available from the ranks of his bickering, factional party. Takeshita’s personal choice, Masayoshi Ito, refused the job because Takeshita and other powerful faction leaders would not accede to his demands to purge the party through anti-corruption political reforms. Uno was then chosen.

Now, Uno is widely perceived as a serious liability for the Liberal Democrats in the upcoming upper house election, in which half the seats are at stake in what some analysts predict could mark the beginning of the ruling party’s decline after 34 years of virtually unchallenged control of Parliament.

A major defeat in the upper house election could force a dissolution of the more powerful lower house of Parliament, a possibility causing some panic among ruling party officials, who fear facing the voters without a strong leader.

Uno was discouraged from campaigning on behalf of conservative candidates in the Tokyo assembly election, an extraordinary slight for the nominal head of the party and leader of the government. But the prime minister cheered from the sidelines.

Importance Stressed

“This election is in the capital, so we must consider it as important as a general election,” Uno told reporters Sunday. “The 71 candidates from the LDP are doing their best, so I pray for them that their efforts will be realized.”

Despite the uproar over the Recruit scandal and Uno’s sex life, widespread antipathy to a 3% consumption tax, introduced by Takeshita under a cloud in April, may prove to be the most damaging issue for the Liberal Democrats.

In an opinion poll conducted by NHK, 77% of the respondents said they would take the controversial tax reform into consideration when they cast their ballots in the upper house election later this month. As many as 54% of those said they want the consumption tax abolished, and another 40% want its implementation slowed down.

The results of this survey, announced today, suggested that the Recruit scandal would be on the minds of 67% of the voters and that 62% would be thinking about Uno’s alleged liaison with the geisha. Nearly eight out of 10 respondents said they feel they cannot expect political reform of the ruling party.

Another issue bogging down the ruling party is the liberalization of agricultural imports. Although this was not a concern in the Tokyo assembly campaign because urban voters generally favor cheaper imported food, it is expected to cut into traditional constituencies in the countryside. In the latest of several by-elections that warned of declining support for the Liberal Democrats, a woman candidate running on the socialist ticket defeated the ruling party favorite in a gubernatorial election on June 25 in rural, conservative Niigata prefecture.