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Japan lawmakers favour revising constitution -Poll
Tokyo, Feb 16: Japan`s Constitution should be revised, said more than 70 percent of those of the country`s lawmakers who responded to a newspaper poll with a majority pointing to the document`s Pacifist clause.
Tokyo, Feb 16: Japan's Constitution should be revised, said
more than 70 percent of those of the country's lawmakers who
responded to a newspaper poll with a majority pointing to the document's Pacifist clause.
Debate is growing in Japan over the US-drafted Constitution,
particularly Article 9, which renounces the right to go to war
and forbids a military, although it has been interpreted as permitting forces for self-defence.
The survey finding came after Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) adopted a party platform in January that included a plan to draft a bill to revise the Constitution by 2005 and a pledge to enact as soon as possible a law spelling out procedures for a referendum. Amendments to Japan's Constitution must be approved by two-thirds of both Houses of Parliament and a majority of voters in a national referendum.
The Tokyo Shimbun daily received replies from 57 percent of the 724 members of the upper and lower Houses of Parliament to whom it sent the poll.
The paper said 72 percent of respondents felt the Constitution should be revised, 20 percent opposed a revision and eight percent gave no answer. When the paper asked those in favour of change to pick up to three topics in the Constitution they felt should be altered, 63 percent picked Article 9 as one area, Tokyo Shimbun said in the report published yesterday.
Support for amending Article 9 is strongest among members of the ruling LDP.
Ninety-six percent of LDP lawmakers who replied to the poll said they support a revision, and 80 percent of these said article nine should be changed. By contrast 68 percent of members of the main opposition Democratic Party who responded wanted a revision, and 55 percent of these wanted changes to the pacifist clause.
Bureau Report
The survey finding came after Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) adopted a party platform in January that included a plan to draft a bill to revise the Constitution by 2005 and a pledge to enact as soon as possible a law spelling out procedures for a referendum. Amendments to Japan's Constitution must be approved by two-thirds of both Houses of Parliament and a majority of voters in a national referendum.
The Tokyo Shimbun daily received replies from 57 percent of the 724 members of the upper and lower Houses of Parliament to whom it sent the poll.
The paper said 72 percent of respondents felt the Constitution should be revised, 20 percent opposed a revision and eight percent gave no answer. When the paper asked those in favour of change to pick up to three topics in the Constitution they felt should be altered, 63 percent picked Article 9 as one area, Tokyo Shimbun said in the report published yesterday.
Support for amending Article 9 is strongest among members of the ruling LDP.
Ninety-six percent of LDP lawmakers who replied to the poll said they support a revision, and 80 percent of these said article nine should be changed. By contrast 68 percent of members of the main opposition Democratic Party who responded wanted a revision, and 55 percent of these wanted changes to the pacifist clause.
Bureau Report