Ex-CDPJ President Edano to Chair Lower House’s Constitutional Commission; LDP Retains Control of Other 2 Commissions

The Yomiuri Shimbun

14:16 JST, November 9, 2024

Former Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan President Yukio Edano has taken up the post of chairperson of the House of Representatives’ Commission on the Constitution, after it had been allocated to the party. This is the first time that an opposition party member has held the post.

The lower house has three committees in total. The other two are the Board of Oversight and Review of Specially Designated Secrets and the Deliberative Council on Political Ethics.

The Liberal Democratic Party and the CDPJ agreed to allocate two of the committee chairmanships to the LDP and one to the CDPJ. The CDPJ had strongly requested that the LDP give it either the constitutional commission or the political ethics council. The LDP eventually gave up the constitutional commission because the party was concerned that if it gave up the political ethics council, the CDPJ would take the lead in holding meetings with “politics and money” on the agenda.

The fact that the forces in favor of constitutional amendment no longer occupy two-thirds of lower house seats, which is necessary to initiate the revision, following the Oct. 27 lower house election, also gave encouraged the LDP to give up the constitutional commission.

Nevertheless, constitutional amendment is the LDP’s party line and there are already voices of opposition within the party. LDP Diet Affairs Committee Chairperson Tetsushi Sakamoto met the party’s conservative heavyweights to apologize on Friday.