"Abenomics" under fire ahead of coming general election

APD

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As official campaign for Japan's general election on Dec. 14 is going to kick off quickly, major political parties here have unveiled their manifestos for the upcoming poll, with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's economic policies dubbed Abenomics being targeted by opposition camp which eyes to terminate Abe's administration.

Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) highlighted in its political pledge for the Dec. 14 election that Abenomics has worked to help boost Japan's sluggish economy with some index such as employment and wage hike showing the trend since late 2012.

The LDP emphasized in the pledge that Abenomics is the only way that can lead Japan to the path of economic recovery, with its policy chief Tomomi Inada vowing that the LDP "will take all kinds of steps for Japan's economic recovery" by pushing forward Abe's economic doctrine featured by three arrows -- aggressive monetary easing, fiscal stimulus and growth strategy.

However, opposition camp blasted the Abenomics fiercely in their manifestos or street speeches, saying the three arrows all misfired and left an enlarged gap of wealth between the rich and the poor, the large enterprises and minor plants, as well as big cities and the rest of the country.

The Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), the main opposition, criticized in its platform that employee's real wages is down for 15 months in a row due to the yen's fast retreating, a by-effect of Abenomics, adding employment booming is actually a boost in numbers of temporaries, rather than normal employees.

"If Abenomics continues as it is now, a range of people from workers, students to pensioners, as well as small and medium sized companies will suffer more," said DPJ leader Banri Kaieda earlier, "we have to change this trend."

An internet poll conducted between Oct. 10 and 21 with valid responses from 4,896 Japanese companies showed about 48.4 percent of them have suffered from the yen's rapid falling, with only 4.9 percent enjoying positive impacts.

The Tokyo Shoko Research, which conducted the survey, said Wednesday that 66.7 percent said they met negative impacts of hikes in imports price and of those affected adversely by the yen' s depreciation, 80.8 percent said they failed to pass hikes in import prices on to their product prices.

The prime minister dissolved the lower house of the parliament last week so as to delay the second round sales tax hike in a move to prevent the further consumption tax hike from jeopardizing his efforts to pull Japan out from prolonged deflation.

However, Kenji Eda, co-head of the Japan Innovation Party, said Wednesday in a press conference that the postponement of the scheduled tax hike was unnecessary since his party has filed a bill to a Diet session to freeze the tax hike from current 8 percent to 10 percent planned in October 2015.

"The aim to dissolving the lower house is to make Abe's administration to survive for a longer term. The decision not takes all consideration of interest of people of Japan," Eda addressed at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan.

The leader of the third largest party in the parliament said Abenomics failed to boost private and regional sectors which he called are the future principal players that could inject more dynamic to the country.

"But the LDP-led administration fundamentally did not believe in the abilities of private sectors, that is why Japan has a lot of regulations and restrictions been built to hold down the sector. It is the limit of the LDP-led government and the reason of the failure of Abenomics," said Eda.

Meanwhile, the Japanese Communist Party (JCP) also called Wednesday in its manifesto to cancel the further sales tax hike and introduced an alternative to the tax hike -- to increase taxes on the wealthy and big companies, and cut spending on wasteful public works projects -- to help address Japan's unhealthy finance, the worst among the major industrialized countries.

For some voters, without saying Abenomics is a failure, they urged Abe, if he could win the looming poll, to complete his economic policies and carry out his work with responsibilities, saying, however, the dissolution of the lower house is unnecessary.

Keiko Yamada, a 60-year-old woman, said she does not think it was necessary to dissolve the lower house. "It seems to me that things are working well," she told Xinhua Thursday near Shibuya Station, "I think Abenomics is not in failure. It makes a happy mood among us. In this point, I think it is successful. But Abenomics has not completed yet. I hope the economic situation would be improved in the future."

"I think the lower house was dissolved by the politicians' conveniences... I don't think the dissolution is important, as the huge cost for the upcoming general election depends on our tax," Hiroaki Kobayashi, 49, a salary man, told Xinhua.

"I don't think Abenomics is in failure. It seems effective for big companies and export companies. But I think that does not spread to small and medium sized enterprises," he added.

"To be honest, any other party except the LDP does not seem to be credible for me. I hope Abe would carry out his work with responsibility. As we have experienced the failure of the DPJ government, I think it is the waste of time to change the party in power," Kobayashi said.

Kanichi Shimotani, 70, criticized that "Abe is escaping from many scandals of his ministers. I think he is trying to hide them by the dissolution (of the lower house). As for Abenomics, the prime minister is all talk, no action. I think it is not absolutely successful. It would be effective for a part of companies like big and export companies, but the effect does not spread to small and medium sized enterprises, and ordinary people like me."

Besides debate on Abenomics, focuses of the general election will be also put on nuclear issue, which the LDP vowed to restart Japan's idle nuclear reactors that are put offline since reactors' meltdown in the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on March 11, 2011 and called on a responsible nuclear policy.

While the DPJ and JCP showed their opposition to nuclear power, with DPJ saying it will mobilize all its sources to eliminate nuclear power in the country in 2030s.

Both of the two parties are opponent to the rights to the collective self-defense, to which the LDP-led government gave green light to the Self-Defense Forces (SDF). The controversial right allows SDF to engage battle outside Japan, but goes contrary to the Japanese pacifist Constitution that bans the SDF to fight overseas.

The general election will kick off on Dec. 14 and the official campaign will be slated for Dec. 2.