Commentary | Axel Klein, Komeito and the Fallout of the Abe Assassination
Being junior partner in a coalition government comes with advantages and disadvantages. One of the benefits is the option to hide behind the senior partner and its prime minister when the going gets tough. Particularly in a one-party-dominant political system like Japan, media criticism is foremost directed at the senior Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) even if the much smaller coalition partner, Komeito (or “Clean Government Party”), is also responsible for government decisions and legislation. Exceptions are rare. The murder of former Prime Minister Abe in July 2022, however, was one such exception.
Soon after the assassination, Abe’s murderer told the police that his motive had been hatred toward the “Family Federation for World Peace and Unification,” a religious group originally from South Korea generally referred to by its former name “Unification Church” (UC). To the assassin, Abe had been one of the most influential UC supporters in Japan. After the first week in which the established news outlets refused to publish the name of the Unification Church, reports on the many earlier cases of problematic and outright illegal activities of UC members dominated the headlines. The Japanese public was treated to daily reminders of the dubious character of the UC and how many decades the group had been pursuing its business models in Japan, ruining many families like the assassin’s in the process.
What gave the issue an even stronger connection to the political world was the large number of Members of Parliament who had maintained contacts with the UC. Over 170 Liberal Democrats had in one form or another asked for (and normally received) support from UC. The critical tenor of most reports was built around the question: How could they? Prime Minister Kishida Fumio reacted by reshuffling his cabinet. He intended to replace all ministers with whom a connection to UC was known. New cabinet members would only be allowed to take office if they could guarantee to not have had contacts with UC. At least one of the new ones, Yamagiwa Daishiro, was proven wrong; he had to resign in October 2022 shortly after taking office.
Even though the LDP was clearly at the center of the coverage and criticism, Komeito must immediately have realized that it was difficult to hide behind the LDP this time. A small number of Komeito politicians had also attended UC events: in a survey by Kyodo News Agency published in late November 2022 eleven subnational MoPs admitted to having had connections or attending such an event. Osaka was a hub of such connections. Yoshida Shōko, for example, a member of the city council in East-Osaka, attended the “World Peace Women Federation,” not knowing, as she said, that it was a suborganization of UC. Her party colleague, Noda Yoshikazu, had even delivered a speech (Title: “The State of East-Osaka”) for the same federation. Upper House member Ishikawa Hirotaka had sent a congratulatory telegram in 2021. All Ishikawa had written was that he was working hard as a politician to keep families intact in order to build a better future.
None of these connections were crucial enough to push Komeito into the limelight, but the fact that the party is based on a religious organization was. Soka Gakkai (Value Creating Society) is Japan’s largest religious organization with a couple of million members (no reliable numbers about active members are publicly available). The religion is based on Nichiren Buddhism and its former president, Ikeda Daisaku, spearheaded the founding of Komeito in 1964. Since then especially female Gakkai members have considered it to be part of their religious practice to support Komeito’s election campaigns. It didn’t take a strategic mastermind to see why the opposition, hungry for issues to attack the ruling parties, would come after this close connection between a ruling party and a religious organization.
For Komeito and Soka Gakkai this wasn’t the first time becoming collateral damage of other religions. After the apocalyptic Aum Shinrikyo was identified as the assailant behind the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system, the LDP used the uproar to damage Komeito. This attack was motivated by the fact that Komeito by that time had joined the New Frontier Party of Ozawa Ichiro, becoming a second large political force with the potential to possibly replace the LDP in government. In response, some Liberal Democrats (among them Kamei Shizuka and Jimi Shōsaburō) organized the “April Society” (shigatsukai) in 1993 as a vehicle to attack Komeito as a prime target for the LDP to maintain power. The Aum terrorism provided additional and highly effective narratives and justification for this strategy. Like in the mid-1990s, in 2022 the LDP was again the main source of criticism and pressure directed at Komeito, albeit this time it was clearly not a conceived strategy of a political enemy but a self-inflicted wound by the coalition partner.
What the LDP’s campaign against Soka Gakkai and Komeito made very obvious to both organizations was their vulnerability against state pressure. Consequently, one key reason for Komeito to join the alliance with its former arch rival in 1999 was protection of Soka Gakkai. Even though this is hardly ever mentioned publicly by Komeito politicians, the ability to keep state authorities from exerting pressure on Komeito’s religious mother organization has been a key benefit of joining with the LDP. Being part of the ruling government has meant enough influence to keep not only religious freedom intact but also the legal framework for Soka Gakkai’s business models in place (especially tax exemptions). In this sense, Soka Gakkai’s party – once detested by other religions – has served as the protector of all religious organizations in Japan since 1999.
And that proved true when Abe was shot. The traditional mass media — most of which had ignored the topic themselves for most of the previous decades — now started to criticize the government for not paying attention, and not acting faster or more strictly against UC. Reports about massive fraud and “spiritual sales” from the 1980s and 1990s were dug up and the question raised: Why didn’t the LDP prohibit UC much earlier? And the answer seemed easy: Liberal Democrats got substantial support from the South Korean religion in the form of (wo)manpower, money, and votes.
But why had Komeito not intervened? Speculation about the party’s true motivations asserted that any measure against UC would have potentially harmed Soka Gakkai. Some media outlets reminded their readers that decades ago Soka Gakkai had solicited enormous donations from its members for the construction of the main reception hall at the Taiseki-ji temple at Mount Fuji. Others reported on “intensive pressure on members to participate in election campaigning for Komeito.” Some second-generation members told journalists that their families had donated huge shares of the household budget and savings to the religion.
There were also rumors that Soka Gakkai had occasionally cooperated with UC in the past to battle their common enemy, the Communist Party. Reversing Komeito’s standard claim to be a “break” to LDP hawkishness, critics now claimed Komeito was a break to any legislative effort to get a handle on religious cults. Many of these critics winked at the fact that the LDP did not push for tighter controls of religions either. Liberal Democrats may have been motivated by their interest to keep the nationalist Nippon Kaigi (Japan Conference) and the Association of Shinto Shrines out of the limelight because some member religions had been accused of “spiritual sales” in the past. There may also be some truth in yet another explanation: Komeito praises itself for the ability of its approximately 3,000 local assembly members to listen to the “small voices.” Those voices, however, are mostly from Gakkai members, not from betrayed UC households. A search on Komeito’s news website for “Unification Church” does not produce a single entry before the Abe murder.
One consequence of the former prime minister’s assassination was Komeito’s decision ahead of its party convention in September 2022 to not carry out its announced generational change at the top. General Secretary Ishii Keiichi had been earmarked to take over from Yamaguchi Natsuo (“Nat-chan” to his supporters), party leader since 2009. Instead, Yamaguchi was re-elected for an 8th time, leaving only Takeiri Yoshikatsu as party leader with a longer time in office (20 years). Ishii remained in his post.
When asked by NHK why he hadn’t resigned as planned the reasons Yamaguchi gave may not have seemed overly convincing to everyone. Before the Upper House election in 2022 Yamaguchi had set a goal for Komeito of 8 million votes but his party only won 6.2 million, the worst result on the national level ever. The logic in other parties would be to replace the leader after such a dismal result. However, there are doubts that any serious observer of the party had expected 8 million people to vote for Komeito anyway, so the number may have been understood within Komeito as mere campaign rhetoric. Yamaguchi now said he needed to stay at the top of his party to do better next time.
A second reason Yamaguchi gave for not stepping down were the up-coming regional elections in spring of 2023. However, if up-coming elections were a reason to postpone the election of a new party leader it is difficult to see how a change of the guard would be possible at all. There are always important national and subnational elections to be prepared and campaigns to be fought.
An explanation for Yamaguchi’s decision that may be more convincing is the rough sea Komeito had to maneuver after the Abe assassination. Basically, there were two storms building: one in its relationship with the LDP, another in maneuvering the UC crisis.
The LDP was heavily affected by revelations of its connections with UC. Prime Minister Kishida’s approval rates dropped and his future political agenda includes issues that will not help to turn the tide (e.g. higher taxes for military defense, constitutional reform). As Yamaguchi said himself, with the demise of two leading Liberal Democrats (former PM Suga Yoshihide and General Secretary Nikai Toshihiro), communication channels and trust between both party leaderships have suffered.
Komeito’s favorite faction within the LDP has been the Motegi group, formerly known as the Keiseikai and led by politicians like Takeshita Noboru, Kanemaru Shin, Ozawa Ichirō, Hashimoto Ryutaro, and Nonaka Hiromu. Takeshita himself told reporters that he had been the one to pitch the idea to Komeito to join a coalition with the LDP in the late 1990s. The faction of the present prime minister is not known for its close ties to Komeito. Kishida may even still hold a grudge or two against Komeito for “stealing” one of his Lower House electoral districts in Hiroshima. There are hawkish nationalists within the LDP who never liked Komeito in the first place for their friendly attitude towards China and for how Komeito has slowed down any effort to reform the constitution. Some of these Liberal Democrats are among those who push an extension of the coalition by integrating the Democratic Party for the People (DPP), a conservative but politically pale opposition party whose leader spoke at the MAGA-dominated J-CPAC in 2022. The DPP would probably weaken Komeito’s role in the coalition but may bring a considerable number of organized votes in the form of labor unions to the table.
A second storm gathered on the legislative front, requiring Komeito to deal with two challenges at the same time: the party had to steer clear of references to religion as much as possible while at the same time avoiding the impression that nothing was done. The conservative daily Yomiuri quoted a leading Komeito politician as saying: “If we don't deal with [the issue] properly, we will be lumped in with the Unification Church.” Not surprisingly, Komeito’s original draft bill to Kishida contained the request that “prejudice and discrimination against religion in general must not be encouraged” (Yomiuri 07 Nov 2022).
Komeito also had to condemn UC without referencing it as a religion. The way General Secretary Ishii framed the issue at a press conference on July 28, 2022 would become the standard pattern of all Komeito politicians asked about UC: the issue is not about religion and politics, it is about a social problem; it is about the connection between politics and an “anti-social group committing illegal acts.” In an interview with NHK Yamaguchi added: “There are a lot of religious organizations which, as part of a healthy democratic process, participate in politics. That’s not a problem.“ Komeito’s further talking points were prioritizing help for victims, preventing future “evil solicitation,” and, of course, avoiding any violation of constitutional rights. This referred first of all to Article 20 of the Japanese Constitution, which guarantees religious freedom.
Secondly, as coalition partner Komeito chose not to criticize the main culprit in this tragedy: the LDP. Open references to the LDP were conspicuously absent, which again is standard operating procedure for Komeito whenever Liberal Democrats invite public criticism. Instead, Komeito’s narrative of events skipped the assassin’s motive and explained that recent legislative initiatives were “triggered by the close scrutiny to the damage done by UC’s solicitation of high donations.” After the Abe assassination “the true scope of the damage done had again come to light.”
Given this context, it is no surprise that the ruling coalition did not touch the law on religious entities (shukyo hojinho) but instead turned to regulations for consumer protection. As Komeito declared, consumer treaty law and the law regarding “Consumer Protection Centers” (CPC, kokumin seikatsu senta) needed to be revised. The proposal intended to give people a stronger and longer right of withdrawal from any donation or purchase, and to speed up any “alternative dispute resolution” (ADR) conducted by CPCs.
Yamaguchi justified his refusal to introduce a limit to donations by arguing that it wasn’t only religious groups that ran on donations. NPO’s and others would depend on these revenues as well and many positive activities be financed this way. As a consequence, the new “Law on the prevention of illegal solicitation of donations by legal entities” contains a paragraph explicitly referring to what should be considered at its implementation: “In implementing this law, the importance of the role played by donations in the activities of legal entities must be considered as well as due consideration given to the academic freedom, religious freedom, and freedom of political activities of individuals and legal entities.” (§12)
The legislative efforts, however, didn’t stop there. Worrying or scaring people by using spiritual arguments and narratives as well as requests for funding through loans or donations from individuals to corporations was also to be penalized. The opposition demanded a legal definition of “mind control” (brain washing) as a criminal offense but according to Komeito that was not feasible because “it is very difficult to define by law the condition of the human mind.” Instead the government settled for a wording that stipulated an “obligation of consideration” (hairyo gimu) so that free individual will would not be suppressed and proper judgement not impeded.
The Japanese Communist Party, however, claimed that none of the new regulations would have prevented the solicitation instruments used by UC. The JCP checked the explanatory comments published by the Consumer Affairs Agency on the new laws and found in one of the Q&A flyers the following statement: “Even if a legal entity violates the ‘obligation of consideration’ and suppresses free will or impedes proper judgement, it is difficult to force the legal entity to return a donation.”
The laws were passed in December 2022 and took effect on January 5th, 2023. News on the prosecution of Abe’s murderer will occasionally remind the public of the issue but the circus has moved on. Kishida’s announcement to raise taxes and spend more on military and security will be up next and yet another challenge for Komeito’s leaders. As self-declared “party of peace” (heiwa no tō) and sympathetic to the Japanese form of radical pacifism it is not easy to argue in favor of arms build-up, even in the face of North Korean missiles flying over Japanese waters, a rhetorically aggressive Xi Jinping to the West, and a war-mad Putin to the North. Like so very often, there is protest within Sōka Gakkai because the principled, ideal world of religion does not easily align with the compromise-laden, often dirty world of politics. This may indeed be another reason for Yamaguchi to remain at the wheel. For the time being, advantages of a junior partner may be short in supply in this coalition.
Dr. Axel Klein is a political scientists and full professor of Modern East Asian Studies and Japanese Politics at Duisburg-Essen University (Germany).
To cite this essay, please use the entry suggested below:
Axel Klein, “Komeito and the Fallout of the Abe Assassination,” criticalasianstudies.org Commentary Board, January 27, 2023; https://doi.org/10.52698/AWRR5624.