Ruling and opposition party leaders touted their campaign platforms around the nation on the first weekend of campaigning for the House of Representatives election, including their measures to cope with the novel coronavirus and revive the economy.
While the leaders of the ruling coalition parties emphasized their achievements in the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and other areas, opposition party chiefs continued to call for different economic policies.
The election campaign has hit its midway point, with voting and ballot counting slated for Oct. 31. The parties are making strenuous efforts to garner more support.
"Preventing infection through vaccines, the improvement of testing, and treatment systems including oral drugs -- by boosting our readiness to tackle these matters, we will get our social and economic activities nearly back to normal," Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said in a street speech in Saga City on Saturday.
To invigorate the economy battered by the COVID-19 pandemic, Kishida said, "By raising incomes, we will create an economy through which people can benefit from the fruits of economic growth."
Kishida is also president of the Liberal Democratic Party. He visited Saga and Fukuoka prefectures on Saturday, calling for people to put their trust in his administration.
Natsuo Yamaguchi, the leader of the LDP's junior coalition partner Komeito, also went to Fukuoka Prefecture on Saturday. In a street speech in Kitakyushu, Yamaguchi criticized the agreement reached by the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan and the Japanese Communist Party, under which the JCP will extend limited support to the government from outside the Cabinet if the CDPJ comes to power.
The JCP "can't take responsibility for the administration if it doesn't have any members in the cabinet. An opaque, unstable administration like that doesn't make sense as an [election] choice," Yamaguchi said.
CDPJ head Yukio Edano gave a speech in front of Ikeburuko Station in Tokyo, as many shoppers and other people went back and forth.
"Japan has become a country in which people can neither achieve affluence nor cherish hope. First and foremost, we need the distribution [of wealth] to invigorate our economy. Let's restore a society in which the vast majority of Japanese consistently see themselves as belonging to the middle class," said Edano.
Edano moved actively around Tokyo on Saturday, calling for more support from voters.
JCP leader Kazuo Shii made street speeches in Tokyo and two other prefectures on Saturday. In Kawasaki, Shii referred to measures against COVID-19, saying: "We have to prepare for a sixth wave of infections. The measures taken thus far have to be amended."
Ichiro Matsui, leader of Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Innovation Party), emphasized the need for administrative and fiscal reforms in speeches that he made in Hokkaido and Miyagi Prefecture on the same day. Yuichiro Tamaki, head of the Democratic Party for the People, spoke in Tokai-mura, Ibaraki Prefecture, appealing for the restoration of the public's trust in politics.
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