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Landslide defeat for ruling party in Japan's poll

Reuters - August 30, 2009

Tokyo – Japanese voters swept the opposition to a historic victory in an election on Sunday, ousting the long-ruling conservative party and handing the novice Democrats the job of reviving a struggling economy.

The win by the Democratic Party of Japan ends a half-century of almost unbroken rule by the Liberal Democratic Party and breaks a deadlock in Parliament, ushering in a government that has promised to focus spending on consumers, cut wasteful budget outlays and reduce the power of bureaucrats.

But the untested party will have to move quickly to keep support among voters worried about a record jobless rate and a rapidly ageing society that is inflating social security costs.

"The people are angry with politics now and the ruling coalition. We felt a great sense of people wanting change for their livelihoods and we fought this election for a change in government," said Democratic Party leader Yukio Hatoyama.

Projections showed the Democrats set for a landslide win, possibly taking two-thirds of the seats in Parliament's powerful 480-member lower house. That matched earlier forecasts of a drubbing for Prime Minister Taro Aso's LDP.

The ruling party loss ended a three-way partnership between the LDP, big business and bureaucrats that turned Japan into an economic juggernaut after the country's defeat in World War II. That strategy foundered when Japan's "bubble" economy burst in the late 1980s and growth has stagnated since.

"This is about the end of the post-war political system in Japan," said Gerry Curtis, an expert on Japan at Columbia University. "It marks the end of one long era, and the beginning of another one about which there is a lot of uncertainty."

Media exit polls showed the Democratic Party had won around 320 lower house seats – almost triple its 115 before the election. The LDP slumped to just over 100 seats from 300.

Aso said he took responsibility for the defeat, adding an LDP leadership race to pick a successor should be held soon.

Support for the LDP, which swept to a huge win in 2005 on charismatic leader Junichiro Koizumi's pledges of reform, has crumbled due to scandals, policy flip-flops and a perceived inability to address the problems of a fast-ageing population.

Hatoyama, 62, the wealthy grandson of a former prime minister, often invoked change during the campaign, a theme that resonated with voters, even if they were unsure his party would pull Japan out of its worst recession in 60 years.

The Democrats have pledged to refocus spending on households with child allowances and aid for farmers while taking control of policy from bureaucrats, often blamed for Japan's failure to tackle problems including a creaking pension system.

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