JAPAN: The opposition Democratic Party of Japan is stepping up its campaign in the big cities in a last-ditch attempt to win over volatile voters and stage a comeback before Sunday's general election.
The change in tactics reflects concern that Junichiro Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party is doing better than expected in the urban centres where it has recently struggled against the DPJ.
Opinion polls have shown the LDP holding a commanding lead in single-seat constituencies and running neck and neck with the DPJ in the proportional representation part of the ballot.
In the last lower house election in 2003, the DPJ narrowly won the PR ballot, which counts for 180 seats in the 480-seat lower house.
A poll in the Sankei newspaper yesterday showed the LDP could even secure an overall majority without the 30 seats Komeito, its junior coalition partner, is expected to win.
Katsuya Okada, leader of the DPJ, yesterday repeated his assertion that his party was doing better than polls suggested. He said the electorate was tiring of Mr Koizumi's showmanship and his insistence on presenting the snap election as a referendum on postal privatisation.
"I think it will be understood that more important issues are at stake than the postal issue and Prime Minister Koizumi's drive to wreck the LDP," he said.
Some political analysts agreed it was too early to write off a DPJ recovery and thought the LDP may have peaked too early.
If the LDP ruling coalition fails to win at least 241 seats, Mr Koizumi has pledged to resign.
Political analysts said Japan's electorate had a history of siding with the underdog, indicating that the LDP's resounding poll results could count against it. They also said that a high turnout meant more votes from the floating voters, who make up more than a third of the electorate.
The result of the election could also be heavily influenced by the 33 districts in which the LDP vote is split between postal rebels and so-called assassins sent in by Mr Koizumi.
Several of those races are too close to call, providing a ray of hope for the DPJ. There were also signs that LDP strategists were beginning to worry that strong opinion polls could count against the party on election night. - (Financial Times Service)