Japan's lower house on Thursday voted down no-confidence motions submitted by the main opposition party against the Cabinet of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and the scandal-hit house speaker Hiroyuki Hosoda, with the ruling coalition rejecting them in a major parliamentary face-off ahead of the upper house election expected next month.
The Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan has accused the Cabinet of doing "nothing" in response to rising prices in Japan and called Hosoda unfit to lead the House of Representatives, the powerful legislative branch controlled by the ruling bloc of the Liberal Democratic Party and its partner Komeito.
The motions were submitted ahead of the end of the 150-day parliamentary session next Wednesday. Campaigning for the House of Councillors election is expected to begin later this month.
The CDPJ has criticized Kishida's Cabinet for only taking measures against rising gasoline prices, centering on subsidizing wholesalers, in the fiscal 2022 supplementary budget.
"To fight rising prices and build people's lives and the Japanese economy, we cannot let the Kishida Cabinet continue," said CDPJ chief Kenta Izumi in parliament.
Ahead of the votes, Tsuyoshi Takagi, the LDP Diet affairs chief, told reporters "no fault" can be attributed to the government's management of the situation nor to its operation of the Diet that warrants a motion of no-confidence, a claim rebutted by the CDPJ.
"It is a fact that many people are worried and discontent," CDPJ policy chief Junya Ogawa said, adding, "We have a responsibility to speak for them."
Ogawa added that it is an "important occasion for Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Mr. Hosoda to reflect on themselves."
Hosoda has been under fire over a recent report by a weekly magazine that said he sexually harassed women including a reporter and an employee of the LDP.
In explaining the intent of the motion against him, CDPJ lawmaker Akiko Okamoto said Hosoda has "failed to fulfill his responsibility to explain himself" over the scandal.
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Japan Diet speaker suspected of bribing local officials in 2021 election
Documents showed Wednesday that Hosoda's camp paid several thousand yen per day in cash to local assembly members and others in western Japan during campaigning for last October's lower house election. If proven to be an instance of bribery, it would violate the election law.
After the votes, the ruling coalition of the LDP and its partner Komeito plan to pass through parliament the remaining bills before the end of the current parliamentary session rather than extending it.
