LDP Not to Endorse Disabled Author Ototake in Tokyo By-Election

From Jiji

April 12 2024

TOKYO – Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party said Friday that it will not give a recommendation on author Hirotada Ototake in the April 28 House of Representatives by-election in the Tokyo No. 15 constituency. 

Ototake, deputy head of First no Kai, a political organization with close links with Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike, said Thursday that he has no plans to ask the LDP to recommend him in the election, in which he will run as an independent.

The by-election for the lower chamber of parliament will be held to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of former LDP member Mito Kakizawa, a former state minister of justice, over a vote-buying scandal.

The LDP, headed by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, was considering whether to support Ototake as a recommended candidate after giving up fielding its own candidate for the constituency.

In another Lower House by-election, also set for April 28, the ruling party has also decided not to have its own candidate in the No. 3 constituency of Nagasaki Prefecture, southwestern Japan.