By DPA,
Tokyo : Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso dissolved the House of Representatives Tuesday to clear the way for general elections to be held Aug 30.
The move followed a cabinet vote to accept embattled Aso’s plans for dissolving the Diet’s lower house.
The general election would be the first since September 2005 when popular former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi helped the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) secure a solid majority, gaining 296 of 480 seats in the lower house.
Since then, however, the party’s fortunes have flagged. Aso, who suffers from low public approval ratings, is the third LDP prime minister in a row to come to power without a popular election. A former foreign minister, Aso took office in September, after the resignation of his predecessor Yasuo Fukuda, who also left office after less than one year.
Analysts said they expected the upcoming election might give the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan the upper hand to take over from the LDP, which has held the reins of power in Japan almost continuously for more than 50 years.
LDP held 303 seats in the now dissolved house and its coalition partner the New Komeito 31, while DPJ had 112 seats. Nine members were independents, and two seats were vacant. The rest were held by other smaller opposition parties.
In his role as LDP leader, Aso apologized to his party’s members Tuesday for a series of humiliating defeats in local elections over recent months and his failure to strengthen solidarity within the party.
The LDP lost its majority this month in Tokyo’s metropolitan assembly, marking its fifth-successive election loss.
Meanwhile, DPJ was engulfed in a political funding scandal, with the office of its former president Ichiro Ozawa accused of receiving donations from a construction company.
Ozawa’s successor Yukio Hatoyama also had to apologise to the public for his office misreporting political contributions of about 22 million yen ($239,000) for four years between 2005 and 2009 by using the names of people who were already dead.