Roundup: Japan's 2nd-largest opposition party sees rift widen as both founders quit amid party turmoil

Two senior members of the Japan Innovation Party (JIP), the nation's second-largest opposition party, announced Thursday they are leaving the party due to internal rifts concerning the management of a local mayoral election, in a move that threatens to severely damage the party's power base.

Toru Hashimoto, supreme adviser of the JIP, and adviser Ichiro Matsui, who is also Osaka's governor, both announced separately Thursday that they were leaving the party they both founded, which political pundits believe could result in the party disbanding completely.

Hashimoto, who is also the mayor of Osaka, summoned executives of the JIP earlier Thursday, with local media reports stating that he told his colleagues he will step down from his role as supreme adviser to focus on local politics and the upcoming gubernatorial and mayoral elections, slated to be held this autumn.

"Please let me focus on Osaka once I leave the party," Hashimoto was quoted as telling the party's upper echelon members, before stating afterwards to reporters that he "will leave the national political party to shift the axis to a regional political party in Osaka."

Hashimoto added that the move was not intended to cause the party to split henceforth and urged other members not to follow suit, but to stay in their roles at the JIP.

"This isn't aimed at dissolving the party and I wish for my fellow party lawmakers to stay on in their positions," Hashimoto said, adding that he and Matsui would focus on the Nov. 22 Osaka gubernatorial and mayoral elections as they intend to put forward candidates from the Osaka Restoration Association political group, which is headed by Hashimoto.

But while Hashimoto played down the inter-party conflict, political watchers said that the JIP had seen rifts deepen of late following Matsui openly and repeatedly blasting the party's Secretary General Mito Kakizawa -- himself a former Defense Ministry official -- for backing Kakizawa on Aug. 14 for the Yamagata mayoral election scheduled for Sept. 13.

Matsui lambasted Kakizawa for throwing his weight behind the former defense ministry official before the party had decided on its official line regarding the Yamagata election, as the official is also being backed by the Japanese Communist Party and the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan.

A disgruntled Matsui openly blasted Kakizawa and other senior party members in a press conference earlier Thursday held at the Osaka prefectural government office, at which he accused the leadership of contracting "Nagatacho disease," a jibe suggesting the party's elders had been overly caught up in dealings at the national Diet, which is based in the Nagatacho region of Tokyo.

"I don't intend to make everyone in the party my enemy, but the current leadership has contracted 'Nagatacho' disease," he said of senior Diet members of the party, who he has accused of being overly willing to cooperate with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his ruling Liberal Democratic Party administration, rather than remaining as an autonomous force capable of surviving as an opposition party come the next election.

The JIP's strife escalated on Wednesday when Matsui offered the party an ultimatum; either Kakizawa steps down or he would, and strongly intimated that if the resignation didn't happen then Hashimoto would also likely relinquish his affiliation to the party too.

But while Matsui was openly riled at the JIP's senior Diet members, Hashimoto attempted to salvage the party in an e-mail he sent to his former party, which was read out by the party's President, Yorihisa Matsuno, the crux of which urged the party Thursday not to disband.

"Hashimoto said we should put an end to something like an internal struggle,"Matsuno was quoted as reading, adding that Hashimoto had also indicated his intention, along with Matsui, to quit the party to focus on local political affairs. But in a slight twist, Hashimoto said that Kakizawa should not be ousted from the party, a stance Matsuno was keen to support, political sources said Thursday.

Matsuno is now looking to create a new party comprising politicians from a number of opposition parties, along with the JIP, in a move that some watchers have said may be a threat to Abe 's power base, as he had consistently relied on Hashimoto -- who along with the prime minister is a staunch right-winger -- to support his unpopular war moves, which include among other things revising Japan's decades-held pacifist Constitution.

JIP members were of opposing views having digested the resignation of the party's two bigwigs, sources close to the matter said Thursday evening, as to whether the party as it currently stands would be weakened, or whether joining forces with other smaller parties could give them more clout to survive in the opposition camp.

However a leading voice from the party said the move would irrevocably damage the party as the two former leaders were the " face of the party."

"Hashimoto and Matsui are, in some ways, the JIP's face itself, " JIP chairman Toranosuke Katayama told a press gathering after the party's meeting of Diet members in Tokyo. He added that their departure is "really painful."

Political watches have been speculating as to whether the Osaka Restoration Association's move on Aug. 19 to register with the government the launch of a new political group based in western Japan's Kansai region, to be known as One Osaka, would lead to a major exodus from the JIP to the new party, causing an insurmountable split in the JIP, as One Osaka, according to the latest reports, already consists of 200 JIP members from both local municipal and prefectural assemblies.

Politicians loyal to the JIP, however, were vociferous in denouncing the two founders for leaving the party, urging them to think long and hard about what they had done.

"It's really disappointing that the two founders will leave the party. I would like those people who created the cause to reflect on what they have done," said Nobuyuki Baba, a lower house member elected in Osaka, at a press briefing at the national Diet building in Tokyo.

Kakizawa, for his part, after gaining support to stay on in his post, said that he would do his utmost to see that inter-party communication becomes a more efficient process, but questioned whether the talk of a party split was, in fact, in the best interest of the JIP.

"I believe there were things that I should reflect on. But, on the other hand, I wonder if it was a wise move to speak about dividing the party or not," quizzed Kakizawa. Endi