Finally, the 48th Lower House election in Japan was over with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's victory, while a huge typhoon was passing Japan from the last Saturday to Monday.
Changes of seats between before and after the election are as follows:
[Ruling parties]
Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) 284 => 284
Komeito 35 => 29
[Oppositions]
Rikken Minsyuto 15 => 55
(CDP: Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan)
Kibonoto (Hope) 57 => 50
Japanese Communist Party 21 => 12
Others 60 => 35
So, the total seats of the ruling parties changed from 319 to 313, while the total of the oppositions and independents changed from 153 to 152 as the total seats of the Lower House were reduced from 475 to 465.
So, outwardly it looks as if two thirds of the Japanese voters approved PM Abe and the conservative ruling parties while one third of voters supported the Oppositions, including conservative and socialistic politicians.
In terms of the ratio among seats in the national Diet, PM Abe got big support for his agenda of modifying the pacifist Constitution, since right-of-center Kibonoto has made it clear to support the modification of the Constitution, though, with some difference in emphasis of specific Articles. However, still half of voters don't want Abe to continue his premiership, according to surveys by newspaper companies.
But the data on the number of voters for each party show a different landscape since most of the winners are from the single-seat electoral districts.
The numbers of voters in proportional-representation constituencies, total 56 million, who voted for the major parties:
LDP 26.5 million
CDP 11 million
Hope 9.7 million
So, the two major opposition parties combined got almost 20 million votes while LDP led by PM Abe got 26.5 million ballots. Most lawmakers of the two Oppositions are from old Democratic Party of Japan that once held power from 2009 to 2012.
The total votes for the opposition parties and independents in the proportional-representation constituencies were 29.8 million while those of the ruling parties led by PM Abe were 25.6 million. So, it is natural that researches tell that half of the Japanese voters don't want Prime Minister Abe, being accused of some scandals, to continue his premiership even while North Korea is making tests of nuclear weapons and missiles in these months.
The voting rate was the second lowest since the end of WWII: 53.68%.
