Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda’s Democratic Party of Japan was routed in elections today, with many of the party’s big guns falling prey to voters’ anger.
A directionless three years under three different prime ministers, who oversaw a series of policy flip—flops, undermined the promise of change the DPJ brought when it came to victory in 2009.
Weak leadership and vicious factional infighting saw the party splinter, testing the patience of voters who were less than impressed with the sometimes confused response to the 2011 meltdowns at the Fukushima atomic plant.
The conservative Liberal Democratic Party, led by the hawkish Shinzo Abe, secured a convincing majority in today’s general election.
Broadcaster NHK, citing forecasts based on its own exit polls, said the LDP had won 275 to 310 seats in the 480—seat lower house, with the DPJ reduced to a rump of between 55 and 77 seats. It won more than 300 seats in the 2009 poll.
New Komeito, the LDP’s junior coalition partner, had 27 to 35 seats, NHK said.
That could give the pair a more than two—thirds majority in the powerful lower house, enough to override the upper chamber in which no party has overall control.
Chief cabinet minister Osamu Fujimura, who has been the face of the government since September 2011 and appeared at regular press conferences, was one of the biggest casualties of the evening.