Japan LDP far ahead of rivals, opinion poll shows
(Reuters)
Updated: 2005-09-01 10:01

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party has widened its lead over its main opposition rival ahead of a general election, with support nearly three times as strong, an opinion poll showed on Thursday, Reuters reported.

Koizumi called the September 11 election after LDP rebels joined the opposition last month to vote down bills to privatise the postal system, a huge organisation with $3 trillion in assets.

The tactic, unusually dramatic for Japan, seems to have resonated with voters even in the urban areas where the leading opposition Democratic Party has tended to be strong, a poll of about 1,000 voters by the Asahi Shimbun daily showed.

According to the poll conducted on August 29 and 30 -- the day campaigning began -- 34 percent of respondents said they supported the LDP while just 13 percent opted for the Democrats.

The LDP was also more than twice as strong as the Democrats in proportional representation districts, where voters select either a candidate or a party, with 29 percent of voters saying they would vote for the LDP against 14 percent for the Democrats.

However, 40 percent said they remained undecided.

The survey also found that 34 percent of voters in urban areas, where the Democrats have tended to be strong, favoured the LDP. The Democrats had just 11 percent support.

However, the gap between the two parties narrowed in rural areas, long the bedrock of LDP support in return for public works projects often funded from the postal service's large coffers.

Some 22 percent of rural voters favoured the LDP while 19 percent supported the Democrats, whose lawmakers voted in parliament against the bills to privatise the postal system.

Koizumi's strategy of portraying the election as a referendum on the issue of postal privatisation, along with sending "assassin" candidates to fight against LDP rebels, has created a rare buzz among Japan's typically apathetic voters.

Half of all respondents to the Asahi poll said they were interested in the election, compared to 44 percent just prior to the previous general election in 2003.

Koizumi has said he will resign if the LDP and its coalition partner, the New Komeito party, fail to win a majority.

Katsuya Okada, the leader of the Democrats, has also vowed to quit if his party cannot take power.

Asked if they wanted Koizumi to remain as prime minister, 43 percent of poll respondents said they wanted him to stay on while 37 percent said he should go.

Asked if they wanted Okada in the same position, only 16 percent said 'yes' while 63 percent said 'no'.

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