Tokyo will lose three single-seat districts and Osaka two under a draft reduction plan for the Lower House compiled by the Liberal Democratic Party, according to a number of high-ranking government officials.
The draft is intended to implement a coalition agreement the LDP reached with Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party) for reducing the number of Lower House seats.
Under the agreement, 45 seats, or about 10 percent of the current total of 465, would be cut.
Twenty seats in the proportional representation constituency would be eliminated.
Nippon Ishin initially called for a reduction of 50 seats in that constituency, but LDP officials felt that would not fly with the smaller opposition parties that garner many seats from the proportional representation system.
That led to the new agreement, and LDP officials went quickly to work alloting the planned reduction among single-seat districts.
Twenty prefectures would lose a total of 25 seats.
Along with Osaka, Kanagawa and Chiba prefectures, which neighbor Tokyo, would also lose two seats.
Sixteen other prefectures, from Hokkaido in the north to Okinawa in the far south, would also lose a single seat each.
The draft plan was based on the 2020 census results, with the number of seats per prefecture reflecting the population ratio.
But the final proposal could change depending on the 2025 census for which results are expected next year.
Nippon Ishin had initially only called for a reduction in seats in the proportional representation constituency because fiddling with the single-seat districts would require addressing the inequality issue of a vote between the most and least populated prefectures.
The emergence of the LDP draft could complicate discussions in the Diet as lawmakers from prefectures that would potentially lose seats will likely be opposed.
The specific proposal for which prefectures would lose seats would be discussed in a deliberative council made up of the ruling and opposition parties set up under the Lower House speaker.
AloJapan.com