Japan Upper House Panel to Vote on Imperial Family Bill Wed.

Tokyo, July 13 (Jiji Press)–A Japanese House of Councillors special committee is set to vote on a bill Wednesday to revise the Imperial House Law, after the major ruling and opposition parties broadly agreed the schedule. Yoshihiko Isozaki, the Liberal Democratic Party’s parliamentary affairs leader at the upper chamber of the Diet, and his counterpart at the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, Yoshitaka Saito, on Monday decided to begin deliberations at the Upper House committee Wednesday and hold a vote within the day. The bill is expected to clear the Diet, the country’s parliament, before the current parliamentary session ends on Friday. The House of Representatives, the lower chamber, approved the bill Friday with support from the LDP-led ruling bloc and some opposition parties, after committee deliberations earlier that day. The revision will allow paternal-line male descendants of former Imperial branches to be adopted into the Imperial Family and female Imperial Family members to retain their status after marriage. Japan’s ruling bloc aims to enact another bill, to create a secondary capital in the country, a priority for the junior ruling Japan Innovation Party, during the current Diet session. Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara told reporters Monday that “there is no need for an extension of the Diet session,” adding that Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi will definitely attend an intensive deliberation session before the Lower House Budget Committee. The Lower House cleared the Imperial House Law revision bill by a majority vote in a plenary meeting on Friday, after the chamber’s steering committee approved it the same day following three hours of deliberations. The Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, which opposes the bill, compiled on Monday an amendment proposal that calls for deleting the provision allowing adoptions of paternal-line male descendants of former Imperial branches, in addition to an early review of whether to give Imperial Family status to the spouses and children of female members. “The ruling bloc’s method is too aggressive,” CDP leader Shunichi Mizuoka said of the efforts to enact the bill. “There is a lack of respect for the Imperial Family.” A Lower House special committee for regional revitalization held a question-and-answer session on the secondary capital bill on Monday. The LDP proposed at the committee’s board meeting to take a vote on the legislation Tuesday, but the Centrist Reform Alliance did not accept this. A senior LDP Diet affairs official told reporters later on Monday that the ruling party would forgo a vote on the bill on Tuesday. “The ruling parties will work together to pass the secondary capital bill during the current Diet session,” Takaichi said at a liaison meeting between the government and the ruling coalition Monday. JIP Secretary-General Hiroshi Nakatsuka replied that the government should “consider extending the Diet session if more days are needed.” On Tuesday, the Upper House’s Cabinet Committee will hear from experts about a bill that would criminalize acts of damaging the Japanese national flag, while the Judicial Affairs Committee will hear expert testimony about a bill to overhaul the nation’s retrial system. The ruling coalition aims to enact these bills in the current Diet session. The ruling and opposition sides agreed to hold intensive deliberations in budget committees as part of efforts to normalize Diet proceedings following an opposition boycott. Negotiations on a specific date have been delayed, however, and opposition forces are demanding that this be decided as soon as possible. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]