Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi took to the streets in western Japan on Saturday, hoping to drum up support for his postal privatisation agenda ahead of a parliamentary election next month.
Koizumi called a September 11 general election after members of the old guard within his ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) helped to defeat bills to privatise the postal system, the pillar of his reform agenda.
Koizumi has said he wants to make the election a referendum on privatising Japan Post, a sprawling business empire with about $3 trillion in assets, as well as on his broader reforms.
"The focal point of the election is whether you favour postal privatisation or are against it," Koizumi told passers-by in Itami. "I dissolved parliament thinking that many among the public will decide that privatisation is necessary."
Main opposition Democratic Party leader Katsuya Okada sought to broaden the focus.
"What people must decide in this election is which party they want to entrust the government to for the next three or four years," Okada said in Toyama, western Japan.
So far, however, Koizumi's gamble of seeking a new reform mandate seems to be paying off.
A Yomiuri newspaper survey conducted from Wednesday to Friday showed that support for Koizumi rose to 53.2 percent, up 5.5 percentage points from a poll taken just after his August 8 decision to call a snap election.
Other recent opinion polls have also shown a rise in Koizumi's support to above 50 percent.
Although the official campaign period for the election does not start for another 10 days, candidates were already busy trying to woo voters, including two running for a seat in western Japan in an election battle full of symbolic significance.
The contrasting opponents - Takafumi Horie, founder of high-flying Internet portal Livedoor who was tapped by Koizumi to run as a de-facto LDP candidate, and Shizuka Kamei, a staunch opponent of Koizumi's postal reforms who split ranks with the LDP to form a new party - exchanged verbal jabs on a TV programme.
"Most of the post offices around the country will disappear if they are forced to face market mechanisms," Kamei said on private broadcaster Fuji Television Network Inc.
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