Thursday, February 18, 2010

Ding! We Have A Majority in Both Houses!

Very quietly yesterday, without any fuss, House of Councillors member Yoshimura Kentaro Gotaro formally registered himself as a member of the Democratic Party of Japan-People's New Party-Shinryokufukai-New Party Nippon caucus. Yoshimura, a district seatholder for Fukuoka Prefecture, had joined the PNP on Tuesday after having quit the Liberal Democratic Party at the very end of last year.

Yoshimura's registration as a member of the DPJ-dominated caucus brings the total number of the active members in the caucus to 122, which is 50% plus one of the 242 seats in the House of Councillors.

For those keeping score at home, the numbers in the House of Councillors are:

DPJ-led four party caucus 122
LDP-Reform Club 82
New Komeito 22
Communist Party 7
Socialist-Rengo 5
Independents 5

If I were Fukushima Mizuho or any other member of the Democratic Socialist Party, I would be thinking hard about keeping my chin up, my eyes bright, a smile glued to my face and, if anyone tries to goad me into offering a comment on whether or not Ozawa Ichiro should testify in the Diet about his accounting troubles, pretend I was stone deaf from now until just after 8 p.m. on election night.

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2 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:49 PM

    Indeed, Indeed!

    It will be interesting to see how long the DPJ keeps to the line (as expressed in the article on this on Asahi) that management of the majority within the HoC will remain difficult and that they still need everyone on board.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Martin J Frid11:47 PM

    If (one of) the smaller parties evaporate, then what will happen to Hatoyama?

    (Word verification: gredness)

    ReplyDelete