Although the public is strongly divided over the Abe administration's pro-nuclear stance, the main opposition camp along with the ruling party are avoiding turning it into a campaign issue for the Dec. 14 Lower House election.
Although the public is strongly divided over the Abe administration's pro-nuclear stance, the main opposition camp along with the ruling party are avoiding turning it into a campaign issue for the Dec. 14 Lower House election.
On Dec. 11, in Satsuma-Sendai, Kagoshima Prefecture, which is home to Kyushu Electric Power Co.’s Sendai nuclear plant, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe briefly touched on the issue for the first time since campaigning began earlier in the month.
While Abe spoke of the Sendai reactors, expected to resume operations next year, he did not use the term “nuclear plant” in his speech.
“The cheap and stable supply of energy is essential to protecting the lives of the Japanese people,” Abe said, emphasizing the significance of atomic power generation. “I really appreciate your providing electricity.”
When the prime minister announced his decision to dissolve the Lower House on Nov. 18, Abe said he hoped to “have fruitful discussions” with opposition parties over atomic power policies.
However, the prime minister had never directly addressed the issue in more than 60 street speeches he's given for the Dec. 14 poll.
“It is not a good idea to make the issue a key point of contention, because many citizens oppose promoting nuclear power,” a local lawmaker said.
In contrast to the pro-nuclear Abe, the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan pledges to phase out all nuclear plants in Japan by the 2030s in its campaign manifesto.
But DPJ leader Banri Kaieda has also avoided directly mentioning atomic power in street speeches, because his party is backed by electronics and electricity labor unions that support resuming operations of reactors.
There is also a disagreement within the DPJ membership about whether to restart reactors, which are currently all offline across the nation for safety inspections and other reasons. It appears to be another reason Kaieda is not willing to address the issue.
Minor opposition parties, however, are not shy about taking a public stand on the issue.
The Japan Innovation Party argues that reactors should not be restarted until it becomes clear when final disposal facilities for radioactive waste will likely be completed, while the Japanese Communist Party, the People’s Life Party, the Social Democratic Party and the New Renaissance Party are opposed to resumption of operations at nuclear plants.
However, nuclear power has not become the main campaign issue even in Fukushima Prefecture, heavily impacted by the nuclear disaster triggered by the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.
LDP member Shinjiro Koizumi, who is a parliamentary secretary in charge of reconstruction from the 2011 disaster, visited Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, on Dec. 11.
“We will work to decommission all reactors in Fukushima Prefecture,” Koizumi vowed in his speech in front of JR Iwaki Station.
But Masayoshi Yoshino, 66, an LDP member running for the Lower House from the Fukushima No. 5 constituency, did not mention the planned restart of reactors in a speech he delivered prior to Koizumi's.
As residents in six municipalities in the electoral district, which hosts Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, are not allowed to live in the area now, 60,000 people are currently forced to lead their lives elsewhere within and outside the prefecture.
While the Japanese Communist Party’s candidate, Eisaku Yoshida, 55, campaigns on a platform of eliminating all reactors across the country as soon as possible, Yoshino and DPJ candidate Izumi Yoshida, 65, have not clarified their stances toward the issue of atomic power in their speeches.
The two have instead spent more time discussing economic policies while campaigning on the street.
The Fukushima prefectural branches of the LDP and the DPJ pledge in their campaign platforms that the parties will work toward the decommissioning of reactors within the prefecture after the Lower House poll. But both do not directly mention possible restarts of reactors outside Fukushima Prefecture.
Behind their passive stances toward the nuclear power issue is the fact that there are many employees of TEPCO and its partner companies in the constituency, so politicians generally avoid vigorously discussing it.
Azusa Fukushima, a 41-year-old DPJ city assembly member in Iwaki, said the trend in the national poll of avoiding a debate over nuclear power may accelerate the dimming of memories of the Fukushima nuclear crisis.
“I am sorry that the nuclear issue has not become the key point of contention, although most of the voters (in the electoral district) are feeling pain from it even now,” Fukushima said.
(Shinichi Sekine contributed to this article.)