Daily News Channel
Lines at polling places spilled out into Tokyo streets Sunday as Japanese citizens showed up in droves to vote in a parliamentary election that is expected to yield a historic shift in political power. With fours hours left until polls closed, 41 percent of eligible voters had cast ballots. While the number is slightly lower than the last elections in 2005, absentee ballots were 162 percent higher this time round, officials said
Voters in Japan will turn out for parliamentary elections Sunday in what poll after poll shows will be a historic shift in political power to oust the ruling party. The Liberal Democratic Party has been in nearly continuous control of Japan’s parliament for more than five decades. But the country’s worst economic crisis since World War II has led a normally sedate electorate to the polls, disgruntled with how slowly the country is emerging from the downturn.
The recession’s latest victim in Japan may not be corporate earnings but the political careers of the ruling party in the country’s parliament. This Sunday in Japan, voters go to the ballot box in what poll after poll shows will be a historic shift in political power, booting out the ruling party. The Liberal Democratic Party, or the LDP, has been in nearly continuous control of Japan’s parliament for more than five decades