Elections

Subterms

    More stories

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Fears of Wider Instability in Iraq After Attack on Prime Minister’s Home

      by

      Armed drones struck the Iraqi prime minister’s home in what was seen as a warning as Iranian-backed groups dispute the results of parliamentary elections.Iraq’s prime minister survived a drone strike on his home early Sunday, Iraqi officials said, raising fears of wider instability after disputed results in Iraq’s parliamentary elections.“I am fine, praise be to God, among my people, and I call for calm and restraint from everyone, for the sake of Iraq,” the prime minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi wrote on Twitter after the pre-dawn attack. In a video appealing for peace, he appeared with his wrist wrapped in what seemed to be a white gauze bandage.A senior official in the Iraqi Interior Ministry, Maj. Gen. Saad Maan, said on state television that the prime minister’s house in the fortified Green Zone had been targeted by three armed drones.Mr. al-Kadhimi, right, with President Barham Salih of Iraq after the attack on Sunday. Iraqi Prime Minister’s Office, via Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIraq’s president, Barham Salih, described the attack as a prelude to a coup, tweeting that “we cannot accept that Iraq will be dragged into chaos and a coup against its constitutional system.”On Friday, tensions over results of the Oct. 10 parliamentary elections came to a head after a clash outside the Green Zone — the site of the executed leader Saddam Hussein’s former palace grounds — where the U.S. Embassy and many other Western diplomatic missions are. Iraqi security forces used tear gas and live ammunition on militia members protesting the election results after the protesters tried to breach the heavily fortified zone’s barriers.A protest on Friday near an entrance to the Green Zone in Baghdad denouncing Mr. al-Kadhimi.Ahmad Al-Rubaye/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesLeaders of Iranian-backed militias — to which most of the protesters belong — have blamed Mr. al-Kadhimi, Iraq’s former intelligence chief, for the use of force that killed at least one person.Asaib Ahl al-Haq, one of the most powerful Iranian-backed militias, identified the person killed as Abdul Latif al-Khuwayldi, one of its brigade deputy commanders. The Iraqi Health Ministry said that more than 120 other people at the demonstration had been wounded, most of them security forces trying to hold back the protesters.Iraq’s election commission has yet to announce final results for the nationwide elections held almost a month ago as it wades through fraud accusations. The Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has emerged as the biggest winner, at the expense of Iranian-backed parties that lost seats. Mr. al-Sadr, whose fighters battled American forces during the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq, is viewed as an Iraqi nationalist with an uneasy relationship with Iran.Political analysts believe those gains were mostly because of a more sophisticated strategy by the Sadrist organization, taking advantage of a new electoral system, which has an increased number of electoral districts. The United Nations, which had observers at the polls, praised the process. The political wings of the militia groups that lost seats claim they were defrauded.One of Mr. al-Kadhimi’s main goals has been to rein in Iranian-backed militias. After 2014, when many were created to fight ISIS, some of the biggest militias have been integrated into Iraq’s official security forces. Those militia forces, though, only nominally answer to the Iraqi government and some are blamed for continuing attacks on U.S. interests.No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack on Sunday on the prime minister’s residence.Iraqi security forces on Saturday outside an entrance to the the Green Zone.Ahmad Al-Rubaye/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMost analysts saw the attack as a warning to Mr. al-Kadhimi and his allies rather than as an assassination attempt. The prime minister has remained in power by balancing Iraqi relations between Iran and the United States, and he is seeking another term.“What we’ve seen in the past is the use of violence, not necessarily to assassinate, but to warn that, ‘We’re here,’” said Renad Mansour, head of the Iraq Initiative at the think tank Chatham House. “I think this would also be a warning perhaps gone wrong because you can gain a bit more popularity and sympathy as the prime minister who survived an assassination attempt.”The attack, though, significantly complicates efforts to form a government. Such efforts rely on forging alliances among parties, some of them with armed wings, to form the biggest bloc in Parliament.An American State Department spokesman, Ned Price, called the strike on Sunday an “apparent act of terrorism” that was “directed at the heart of the Iraqi state.”Although Mr. al-Kadhimi said that both he and those who work with him were fine, the Iraqi military command said that several guards were being treated for injuries.Photographs released on state media of damage to the house showed cracked concrete steps, doors apparently blown off their hinges and what looked like shrapnel holes in the back of a parked vehicle.A photograph made available by a media office of the Iraqi government showed damage inside the home of Mr. al-Kadhimi after the drone attack on Sunday.Iraqi Prime Minister’s Office, via EPAMr. al-Sadr, whose movement has won the highest number of seats of any political bloc in Parliament, described the attack as an attempt to return the country to the control of “nonstate forces to make Iraq live under riots, violence and terrorism.”Iranian-backed groups that have previously threatened Mr. al-Kadhimi condemned the drone strikes.Asaib Ahl al-Haq, the militia group, which was among those that lost seats in the parliamentary elections, called the strikes an attempt to divert attention from the deadly clash outside the Green Zone on Friday and blamed foreign intelligence agencies.A spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, Saeed Khatibzadeh, expressed relief that the Iraqi prime minister had not been hurt in the attack. In a statement, Mr. Khatibzadeh blamed the strikes on an unspecified foreign plot.Abu Ali al-Askari, the nom de guerre of one of the leaders of Kitaib Hezbollah, a main Iranian-backed militia, accused Mr. al-Kadhimi of playing the role of a victim and said that no one in Iraq considered the Iraqi leader’s home worth losing a drone over.“If there is anyone who wants to harm this Facebook creature there are many ways that are less costly and more guaranteed to achieve this,” he said in a posting on his Telegram channel.While the attack has raised fears of growing instability amid Iraq’s political turmoil, the country’s citizens seemed to generally shrug it off. Later Sunday morning, the start of the Iraqi workweek, Baghdad streets were full of the normal rush-hour traffic jams.Near one of the entrances to the Green Zone, food vendors placed spatchcocked chickens to cook over charcoal grills on crowded sidewalks. Inside a butcher shop, a green parrot perched on a pole greeted customers by chirping out “meenoo” — “who is that” in the Iraqi dialect of Arabic.“We are used to these incidents,” said Ali al-Hussayni, 50, the shop owner, about the attack on Mr. al-Kadhimi. “I am not saying people are not scared at all, but we have seen far worse than this.”Reporting was contributed by More

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      ‘Aquí nadie va a elegir’: Ortega aplasta a la disidencia en Nicaragua

      by

      El presidente Daniel Ortega acalló a la oposición y sembró el miedo en los votantes, lo cual prácticamente garantiza su victoria en la contienda presidencial del domingo.MANAGUA, Nicaragua — Después de sofocar de una forma muy metódica a la competencia y la disidencia, el presidente Daniel Ortega prácticamente se aseguró la victoria en las elecciones presidenciales del domingo, lo que indica la caída de Nicaragua en un régimen autocrático.Ortega, en su búsqueda de un cuarto mandato consecutivo como presidente del país, arrestó a todos los adversarios con credibilidad que planeaban contender contra él, cerró los partidos de oposición, prohibió los actos de campaña multitudinarios y clausuró todos los centros de votación.La comisión que supervisa las elecciones quedó en manos de sus leales y no ha habido debates públicos entre los cinco candidatos restantes, todos ellos miembros poco conocidos de partidos alineados con el gobierno sandinista de Ortega.“No son elecciones, una farsa es lo que va a haber”, dijo Berta Valle, la esposa de uno de los líderes de la oposición que está en prisión. “Aquí nadie va a elegir. Es que el único candidato es Daniel Ortega”.El control casi absoluto de Ortega sobre Nicaragua, según los analistas, ha dado paso a una nueva era de represión y terror en el país, lo cual marca un giro hacia un modelo abiertamente dictatorial que podrían imitar otros líderes en toda América Latina. Su declaración de victoria supondría otro golpe a la agenda del presidente estadounidense, Joe Biden, en la región, donde el gobierno no ha conseguido frenar la caída antidemocrática ni el éxodo masivo de personas desesperadas hacia Estados Unidos.Miembros del ejército de Nicaragua preparan las boletas de votación para distribuirlas antes de las elecciones del domingo.Oswaldo Rivas/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesSe ha interceptado a un número inédito de nicaragüenses al cruzar la frontera suroeste de Estados Unidos este año, ya que miles de personas huyeron del país después de que Ortega comenzó a reprimir a la oposición. Y más de 80.000 nicaragüenses viven como refugiados en la vecina Costa Rica.“Este es un punto de inflexión hacia el autoritarismo en la región”, dijo José Miguel Vivanco, director de la División de las Américas de Human Rights Watch, quien describió la represión de Ortega como “una película de terror en cámara lenta”.“Ni siquiera está tratando de mantener una especie de fachada de gobierno democrático”, dijo Vivanco del líder nicaragüense. “De manera flagrante y abierta, está decidiendo hacer de las elecciones una representación”.En junio, Ortega acusó a la oposición de intentar organizar un golpe de Estado. “No estamos juzgando candidatos”, dijo sobre sus críticos que habían sido arrestados. “Aquí se está juzgando a criminales que han atentado contra el país, contra la seguridad del país”.Ortega llegó al poder por primera vez tras ayudar a liderar la revolución que derrocó la dictadura de Anastasio Somoza en 1979. Más de una década después, fue destituido por los electores nicaragüenses, en la que se consideró la primera elección democrática del país.Esa lección sobre los riesgos del gobierno democrático parece haber marcado el resto de la vida política de Ortega. Regresó a la presidencia en 2007, tras conseguir que un partido rival aceptara una reforma legal que permitía a un candidato ganar las elecciones con solo el 35 por ciento de los votos, y luego pasó años debilitando las instituciones que sostenían la frágil democracia nicaragüense.Dejó claro que no toleraría la disidencia en 2018, cuando envió a la policía a reprimir con violencia las protestas contra su gobierno, lo que provocó cientos de muertos y acusaciones de grupos de derechos humanos de crímenes contra la humanidad.Mujeres se enfrentan con la policía antidisturbios durante una protesta contra el gobierno de Ortega en Managua, en 2018.Inti Ocon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesPero la repentina oleada de detenciones antes de las elecciones, que envió a siete candidatos políticos y a más de 150 personas a la cárcel, transformó el país en lo que muchos activistas describieron como un Estado policial, donde incluso las expresiones leves de disidencia son silenciadas por el miedo.Hace poco, un cronista deportivo fue encarcelado por una serie de publicaciones en Twitter y Facebook que criticaban al gobierno, en virtud de una nueva ley que impone hasta cinco años de cárcel a quien diga algo que “ponga en peligro la estabilidad económica” o el “orden público”.Tras el inicio de las detenciones, Estados Unidos impuso nuevas sanciones a funcionarios nicaragüenses y la Organización de los Estados Americanos condenó al gobierno. Este mes, el Congreso estadounidense aprobó una ley que exige más medidas punitivas para Nicaragua. Pero esa presión no le ha impedido a Ortega eliminar de manera sistemática cualquier obstáculo a su victoria del domingo.Una encuesta reciente mostró que el 78 por ciento de los nicaragüenses considera que la posible reelección de Ortega es ilegítima y solo el 9 por ciento apoya al partido gobernante. Sin embargo, muchos se niegan a cuestionar al gobierno en público, por miedo a ser detenidos o acosados por los representantes del partido sandinista que están apostados en todos los barrios para vigilar las actividades políticas.La lideresa de un grupo de vigilancia electoral, Olga Valle, abandonó el país después de que el gobierno de Ortega comenzó a perseguir a cualquiera que hablara en su contra.“Había mucho temor de dar la cara”, explicó Valle. “Hay una restricción absoluta de las libertades, la ciudadanía está sin ninguna posibilidad de reunirse, de organizarse”.La primera aspirante a la presidencia que fue atacada fue Cristiana Chamorro, la principal opositora nicaragüense e hija de la mujer que desbancó a Ortega en 1990 tras su primera etapa en el poder.La policía puso a Chamorro bajo arresto domiciliario un miércoles de junio, el día después de que Antony Blinken, el secretario de Estado estadounidense, pronunciara un discurso en la vecina Costa Rica sobre la importancia de fortalecer la democracia.Cristiana Chamorro, la líder de la oposición más importante de Nicaragua, fue puesta bajo arresto domiciliario en junio.Inti Ocon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFélix Maradiaga, quien también aspiraba a contender contra Ortega, fue encarcelado días después, y permaneció ahí durante meses antes de que a su hermana se le permitiera una visita de 20 minutos.Su esposa, Berta Valle, exiliada en Estados Unidos desde que recibió amenazas tras las protestas de 2018, dijo que su marido ha perdido 20 kilos y que durante meses el único baño en su celda era un agujero. El político nicaragüense le contó a la familia que se le obliga a permanecer en completo silencio, excepto cuando se le somete a interrogatorios diarios. “Es una tortura psicológica”, dijo su esposa.A Maradiaga se le ha permitido reunirse con su abogado en una sola ocasión, rodeado de guardias fuertemente armados, añadió su esposa. Poco después, el abogado huyó del país.Para el mes de agosto, el único de los partidos de la oposición que quedaba en pie era Ciudadanos por la Libertad, un movimiento de la derecha al que algunos especulaban que se le permitiría contender para dar al menos la impresión de una lucha justa. Pero después la comisión electoral dio una conferencia de prensa en la que anunció la desaparición del partido.“Ni siquiera terminé de verla”, comentó Kitty Monterrey, presidenta del partido. “Cogí mis pasaportes y salí corriendo. No miré atrás”.Se escabulló al caer la noche, a fin de evadir a la policía que se había apostado en la entrada. Para llegar a Costa Rica, Monterrey atravesó ríos a pie y a caballo durante 14 horas. Cumplió 71 años el día de su viaje.“Esto no es un proceso electoral en absoluto”, denunció Monterrey. “Las elecciones se dan cuando se tiene derecho a elegir, pero todos están en el exilio o en la cárcel”.Nicaragüenses en Costa Rica protestan contra el gobierno de Ortega, en San José, Costa Rica, en septiembre.Mayela Lopez/ReutersEn Nicaragua no hay observadores electorales, solo los llamados “acompañantes” electorales, una mezcla de funcionarios traídos de países como España, Argentina y Chile, muchos de los cuales son miembros de sus partidos comunistas locales. Su trabajo, dijo hace poco una integrante de la comisión electoral, no consiste en “intervenir” sino en “ver” y “disfrutar” del proceso electoral.En todo el país hay pocos indicios de que se esté disputando el cargo más alto de la nación.Imágenes gigantescas de Ortega y su esposa, la vicepresidenta del país, se ciernen sobre las calles. Los sitios de vacunación reproducen estribillos revolucionarios con títulos como “el comandante se queda”. En los edificios gubernamentales ondea la bandera del partido sandinista junto a la bandera de Nicaragua.Pero además de un puñado de folletos con logotipos de los partidos de la oposición en Managua, la capital, no hay espectaculares ni carteles de campaña en los que aparezca nadie más.“A Ortega se la cayó la máscara”, dijo Valle, la esposa del líder opositor encarcelado. “Él no va a poder esconderse nunca más”.Berta Valle, quien ha estado exiliada en Estados Unidos desde que enfrentó amenazas del gobierno, habla en un foro en Miami en octubre.Cristobal Herrera-Ulashkevich/EPA vía ShutterstockOscar Lopez colaboró con este reportaje desde Ciudad de México. More

    • 75 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      In Nicaragua Election, Ortega Crushes Dissent

      by

      President Daniel Ortega quashed the opposition and struck fear in voters, all but guaranteeing his victory in a presidential contest on Sunday.MANAGUA, Nicaragua — After methodically choking off competition and dissent, President Daniel Ortega all but ensured his victory in a presidential contest on Sunday, signaling Nicaragua’s descent into autocratic rule.In his quest for a fourth consecutive term as the country’s president, Mr. Ortega detained all credible challengers who planned to run against him, shut down opposition parties, banned large campaign events and closed voting stations en masse.The commission that monitors elections has been entrusted to his loyalists and there have been no public debates among the contest’s five remaining candidates, all of whom are little-known members of parties aligned with Mr. Ortega’s Sandinista government.“This isn’t an election, this is a farce,” said Berta Valle, the wife of one of the opposition leaders who has been jailed. “No one will elect anyone, because the only candidate is Daniel Ortega.”Mr. Ortega’s path to near total control of Nicaragua has ushered in a new era of repression and terror in the country, marking a turn toward an openly dictatorial model that could set an example for other leaders across Latin America, analysts said. His claim to victory would deliver another a blow to President Biden’s agenda in the region, where the administration has failed to slow an anti-democratic slide and a mass exodus of desperate people toward the United States. Members of Nicaragua’s army prepared ballots for distribution ahead of Sunday’s election.Oswaldo Rivas/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesA record number of Nicaraguans have been intercepted crossing the southwest border this year as thousands fled the country after Mr. Ortega began crushing his opposition. And more than 80,000 Nicaraguans are living as refugees in neighboring Costa Rica.“This is a turning point toward authoritarianism in the region,” said José Miguel Vivanco, head of the Americas region for Human Rights Watch, who called Mr. Ortega’s crackdown “a slow motion horror movie.”“He is not even trying to preserve some sort of facade of democratic rule,” Mr. Vivanco said of the Nicaraguan leader. “He is in a flagrant, open manner, just deciding to treat the election as a performance.”Mr. Ortega in June accused the opposition of trying to foment a coup. “We are not judging candidates,” he said of his critics who had been arrested. “We are judging criminals who have threatened the country.”Mr. Ortega first came to power after helping lead the revolution that overthrew the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza in 1979. More than a decade later, he was ousted by Nicaraguan voters, in what was considered the nation’s first democratic election.That lesson about the risks of democratic rule appears to have shaped the rest of Mr. Ortega’s political life. He took office again in 2007, after getting a rival party to agree to a legal reform that allowed a candidate to win an election with just 35 percent of the vote. He then spent years undermining the institutions holding together the country’s fragile democracy.He made it clear that he would not tolerate dissent in 2018, when he sent police to violently smother anti-government protests, leading to hundreds of deaths and accusations by human rights groups of crimes against humanity.Women clashed with riot police during a protest against Mr. Ortega’s government in Managua, in 2018. Inti Ocon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut the sudden sweep of arrests preceding the elections, which sent seven political candidates and more than 150 others to jail, transformed the country into what many activists described as a police state, where even mild expressions of dissent are muted by fear.A sportswriter was recently imprisoned for a series of posts critical of the government on Twitter and Facebook, under a new law that mandates up to five years in jail for anyone who says anything that “endangers economic stability” or “public order.” After the detentions began, the United States placed new sanctions on Nicaraguan officials and the Organization of American States condemned the government. This month, Congress passed legislation demanding more punitive measures on Nicaragua. But that pressure has not stopped Mr. Ortega from systematically eliminating any obstacle to his victory on Sunday.A recent poll showed that 78 percent of Nicaraguans see the possible re-election of Mr. Ortega as illegitimate and just 9 percent support the ruling party. Yet many refuse to question the government in public, afraid that they will be arrested or harassed by Sandinista party representatives who are stationed in every neighborhood to monitor political activities.The leader of one electoral watchdog group, Olga Valle, left the country after Mr. Ortega’s government began targeting anyone who spoke out against it.“There was a lot of fear of showing your face,” said Ms. Valle. “There is a total restriction of freedoms, people have absolutely no ability to meet, to organize.”The first aspiring presidential candidate to be targeted was Cristiana Chamorro, Nicaragua’s most prominent opposition leader and the daughter of the woman who unseated Mr. Ortega in 1990 after his first stint in power.Police officers put Ms. Chamorro under house arrest on a Wednesday in June — the day after Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivered remarks on the importance of strengthening democracy next door in Costa Rica.Cristiana Chamorro, Nicaragua’s most prominent opposition leader, was put under house arrest in June. Inti Ocon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFélix Maradiaga, who also planned to run against Mr. Ortega, was tossed in jail days later and kept there for months before his sister was allowed a 20-minute visit.His wife, Berta Valle, who has been in exile in the United States since facing threats after the 2018 protests, said her husband has lost 45 pounds and for months his only bathroom was a hole in his cell. He told family that he is forced to remain in complete silence, except when he is subjected to daily interrogations. “It’s psychological torture,” she said.Mr. Maradiaga has been allowed one meeting with his lawyer, surrounded by heavily armed guards, his wife added. That lawyer has since fled the country.By August, the only opposition party left standing was Citizens for Liberty, a movement on the right that some speculated would be allowed to run to at least give the impression of a fair fight. But then the electoral commission held a news conference announcing the party had been shut down.“I didn’t even finish watching it,” said Kitty Monterrey, the party’s president. “I grabbed my passports and I ran. I didn’t look back.”She slipped out in the late afternoon, avoiding the police who had been stationed out front. To reach Costa Rica, Ms. Monterrey trudged through rivers on foot and horseback for 14 hours. She turned 71 the day of her journey.“This is not an election process at all,” Ms. Monterrey said. “Elections are when you have the right to choose, but everyone is either in exile or in prison.”Nicaraguans protested against the government of Mr. Ortega in San Jose, Costa Rica, in September.Mayela Lopez/ReutersThere are no election observers in Nicaragua, only so-called “election companions,” a hodgepodge of officials brought in from countries like Spain, Argentina and Chile, many of whom are members of their local communist parties. Their job, one member of the electoral commission recently said, is not to “intervene” but rather to “watch” and “enjoy” the voting process.Across the country, there are few signs that a contest for the nation’s highest office is underway.Gigantic images of Mr. Ortega and his wife, who is his vice president, loom over the streets. Vaccination sites play revolutionary jingles with titles like “the commander stays.” Government buildings fly the flag of the Sandinista party next to the national flag of Nicaragua.But aside from a smattering of fliers with opposition party logos in Managua, the capital, there are no billboards or campaign posters featuring anyone else.“Ortega’s mask is off,” said Ms. Valle, the wife of the imprisoned opposition leader. “He can’t hide anymore.”Berta Valle, who has been in exile in the United States since facing threats from the government, speaking at a forum in Miami in October.Cristobal Herrera-Ulashkevich/EPA, via ShutterstockOscar Lopez contributed reporting from Mexico City. More

    • 113 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      A.N.C. Suffers Worst Election Setback Since End of Apartheid

      by

      In nationwide municipal elections, South Africans rebuked the African National Congress, handing it less than half the collective vote for the first time in its history.JOHANNESBURG — The African National Congress, South Africa’s once-vaunted liberation movement, suffered its worst election showing since coming to power in 1994, according to the results of municipal elections released Thursday.Facing widespread anger over corruption and collapsing services, the party won less than 50 percent of the vote nationally on Monday, the first time in its history that it has failed to cross that threshold.Voters went to the polls on Monday to choose councilors and mayors to govern towns and cities, but they used the opportunity to vent their grievances over national issues, including record unemployment and anger over the handling of Covid. The result was a resounding rebuke for the A.N.C., particularly in urban areas. Significantly low voter turnout was a further indictment of the A.N.C. and of the main opposition parties, with voters choosing smaller, identity-driven parties.After municipal setbacks in 2016, A.N.C. leaders promised to “learn from our mistakes,” and they staked their hopes this year on polling that found President Cyril Ramaphosa with a higher approval rating than that of his party.But however warmly South Africans may feel toward their president, they see a disconnect between his message of national renewal and the corruption that has sullied his party and crippled municipalities.“They listen to him, they like him,” said Mcebisi Ndletyana, a political scientist at the University of Johannesburg. “But when they lower their eyes to the local leaders that are there, they see mediocrity.”Not since the 1990s, when Nelson Mandela was the face of the party, has the A.N.C. so heavily relied on the personality of its leader in a local election, said William Gumede, chair of the Democracy Works Foundation. It was not enough to convince voters, but the A.N.C. may have dipped below 40 percent if Mr. Ramaphosa were not at the center of the campaign, Mr. Gumede said.In the aftermath of the embarrassing showing this week, Mr. Ramaphosa is likely to face leadership challenges from within his party. To replace him, his opponents will have to find a unifying candidate. Mr. Ramaphosa, in turn, may have to fire tainted but popular leaders, Mr. Gumede said.This fallout could lead to a split in the ruling party but prove to be good for South African voters.“It’s really energized the country again. There was a sense of despair and hopelessness in the country because the A.N.C. was this dominant force,” Mr. Gumede said.President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa campaigning on behalf of the African National Congress in Sebokeng, south of Johannesburg, last week.Joao Silva/The New York TimesEven with its losses Monday, the A.N.C. remains South Africa’s dominant party, having secured 46 percent of the vote.But the modest victory means it will now be forced to enter coalitions with smaller parties in cities it once comfortably controlled. It will also have to pursue political compromises in Gauteng Province, home to the economic capital, Johannesburg, and Pretoria, the seat of government.A.N.C. officials tried to cast the results in the best light.“We’re not a loser here,” Jessie Duarte, the party’s deputy secretary general, said at a news briefing on the floor of the results center in Pretoria. “As far as we’re concerned, we are the winning party on that board.”But Ms. Duarte acknowledged that voters had sent a message.“We do not disrespect the electorate,” she said. “They’ve spoken.” She said the party would be “pragmatic” in analyzing its losses.Yet it was not simply the losses that unsettled A.N.C. leaders. Many South Africans appeared to be sending a message by not casting ballots at all. Voter turnout was 47 percent, an 11 percentage point drop from the last election.While political parties sought to blame the low turnout on a campaign season compressed by Covid-19 regulations and poor weather in some parts of the country, many observers attributed it to a dispiriting political landscape. Inaction at the polls, one analyst suggested, was a form of action.ANC supporters held signs displaying their grievances last week while waiting for the arrival of Mr. Ramaphosa in Sebokeng.Joao Silva/The New York Times “We need to start analyzing and speaking about not voting as a political activity in itself,” said Tasneem Essop, a researcher at the Society, Work and Politics Institute at the University of the Witwatersrand.Lungisile Dlamini, a 28-year-old schoolteacher who lives in Johannesburg’s Alexandra township, was among those South Africans who did not go to the polls.“I didn’t see the need,” she said. “They’re not doing anything, so what’s the point of voting?” Daniel Vinokur, 27, worked as an auditor during the ballot count — but none of the ballots counted was his, he said.“I just don’t have a political party I identify with,” he said.Many of those who did vote said they were motivated by national issues, like South Africa’s stagnant economy and record unemployment, which have been made worse by the Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting lockdown measures.“I’m thinking about the youth,” said Bongile Gramany, a 62-year-old A.N.C. supporter who voted at a church in Alexandra township. “If they can help the youth to get jobs, to get skills, I’ll be happy.”Like many of the party’s backers, Ms. Gramany pointed to the A.N.C.’s governing experience and said she believed that “they can change.”The party still plays an outsize role in South Africa’s political landscape and in voters’ psyches, said Ms. Essop, the political analyst. For some South Africans, the decision not to vote, or to vote for a smaller party, may have partly been meant to punish a party that has fallen short of the ideals of Mandela, its famed leader, she said.Residents in Lichtenburg waited last month to collect Covid-19 relief grants.Joao Silva/The New York Times Still, despite a record 95,427 candidates running for 10,468 council seats, the main opposition parties struggled for traction. The Democratic Alliance, which is the leading opposition, failed to make gains, instead, losing support by 5 percentage points since 2016.Opposition parties that did attract voters drew on issues of identity in communities where people felt let down by the governing party.In KwaZulu-Natal Province, once an A.N.C. stronghold, the Inkatha Freedom Party leaned on a history of Zulu nationalism to help it win nearly a quarter of the vote in the largely rural province.Similarly, the Freedom Front Plus, a historically Afrikaner nationalist party that repositioned itself as a bulwark for all minorities against the A.N.C., increased its support across the country.These gains may be a sign that South African voters are shifting to the political right. Instead of the “big ideologies” of left-wing parties, said Susan Booysen, head of research at the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection in Johannesburg, some voters may want parties and civic organizations they believe “can get things done.”“I think it is relatively easy for a community to turn to that direction,” she said, “when they are exposed to such harsh conditions, and when national government does not lend a helping hand.” More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      How Glenn Youngkin Activated White Racial Anxiety and Won Over Voters

      by

      Glenn Youngkin’s defeat of Terry McAuliffe in the Virginia governor’s race shocked some. But it resulted from multiple factors. Democrats still haven’t delivered on their promises or moved major legislation — their infrastructure, social spending and voting rights bills — through Congress. And McAuliffe ran a last-cycle campaign, an anti-Donald Trump campaign.Of course, there are structural, historical patterns that still hold true in states like Virginia, where voters tend to punish whichever party controls the White House. But what can’t be denied is the degree to which Youngkin successfully activated and unleashed white racial anxiety, positioning it in its most potent form: as the protection of the vulnerable, innocent and helpless. In this case, the white victims in supposed distress were children.Youngkin homed in on critical race theory, even though critical race theory, as Youngkin imagines it, isn’t being taught in his state’s schools. But that didn’t matter.There are people who want to believe the fabrication because it justifies their fears about displacement, powerlessness and vulnerability.In fact, the frenzy around critical race theory is just the latest in a long line of manufactured outrages meant to tap into this same fear, and the strategy has proved depressingly effective.There was the fear of “race-mixing” among children — including the notion that Black boys might begin dating white girls following the desegregation ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. (By the way, this was a variation on the ancient and dusty fear peddled during Reconstruction that not only were Black men incapable of governing, but their rapacious nature also put white women at risk of rape and devilment.)There was the fear of a collapse of the Southern way of life and society following the successes of the civil rights movement. That gave rise to the Republicans’ “Southern strategy.”Richard Nixon used the fear of a lost generation to launch his disastrous war on drugs, which was not really a war on drugs at all but yet another way to ignite white racial anxiety.Nixon aide John Ehrlichman would later tell Harper’s Magazine:“The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”Ronald Reagan employed the myth of the welfare queen to anger white voters.As The New Republic put it, “the welfare queen stood in for the idea that Black people were too lazy to work, instead relying on public benefits to get by, paid for by the rest of us upstanding citizens.”This, even though, as the Economic Policy Institute pointed out, “Compared with other women in the United States, Black women have always had the highest levels of labor market participation regardless of age, marital status, or presence of children at home.” In fact, working-class white people have benefited most from assistance from the government.George H.W. Bush ginned up fears of white women being raped by Black former prisoners with his 1988 Willie Horton ad, hammering home a tough-on-crime message.Even Democrats got in on the action during Bill Clinton’s presidency with their “crack baby” mythology, painting a dystopian portrait of an entire generation. Black children and young adults, they implied, were “superpredators,” unrepentant, incorrigible criminals who roamed the streets, willing “to knock my mother on the head with a lead pipe, shoot my sister, beat up my wife, take on my sons,” as then-Senator Joe Biden said.Sarah Palin tried her best to other Barack Obama and make white people afraid of him, accusing the Illinois senator of “palling around with terrorists.” At the same time, birthers were questioning if Obama was born in the United States and wondering whether he was Christian or Muslim.Then came Donald Trump, the chief birther, who ratcheted up this fear appeal to obscene levels, positioning Mexicans as rapists and Muslims as people who hate America. He disparaged Black countries, demonized Black athletes and found some “very fine people” among the Nazis in Charlottesville.So it’s no wonder Youngkin’s critical race theory lie worked. The parasite of white racial anxiety needed a new host, a fresher one.You could argue that the Democrats made missteps in Virginia. Absolutely. But, to win, Democrats also needed to tamp down white people’s fears, which is like playing Whac-a-Mole.Some of the very same people who voted against Donald Trump because they were exhausted and embarrassed by him turned eagerly to Youngkin because he represented some of the same ideals, but behind a front of congeniality.Youngkin delivered fear with a smile.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook and Twitter (@NYTopinion), and Instagram. More

    • 113 Shares159 Views

      in Elections

      Where and How You Can Vote on Election Day

      by

      Just because it’s an odd-numbered year — a hiatus from Electoral College math and midterm machinations — doesn’t mean that Tuesday’s elections are lacking national implications and drama. There is an array of key races across the country, from gubernatorial contests in Virginia and New Jersey to mayoral elections in New York City, Boston and Minneapolis, where voters will also decide the future of that city’s embattled police department. In Pennsylvania, a state Supreme Court seat — an elected position — is at stake, as are a multitude of municipal school boards and other local offices.Here’s a guide to where and how you can vote.Is there an election where I live?If you live in Colorado, Maine, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia or Washington State, you have statewide elections on Tuesday. By using Vote411 and entering your address, you can find out more about more about the elections where you live.How can I find out what I’m voting on?Each state and many municipalities typically post copies of sample ballots online so that voters can familiarize themselves with the candidates and referendum questions. Vote411 also keeps a full list of races.Where do I vote?If you want to vote in person, each state has an online portal where you can look up your polling location and hours (and see if you have early-voting options).Do I need to show identification?Some states require voters to show identification. You can find out here whether your state has an ID requirement, and if so, what forms of ID qualify.What if I’m turned away?Most states are required to offer residents a provisional ballot if poll workers can’t find your registration, which can happen if there’s a clerical error. Be sure to ask for a provisional ballot, which will be counted once election officials verify your registration. Can I vote by mail?Many states require mail-in ballots to be postmarked by Election Day, so if you haven’t requested one by now, it may be too late. Depending on your state, you may be able to pick up and return a mail ballot at an election office.How do I report voter suppression?You can contact the election office for your state or territory, or you can file a report with the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department. The Justice Department also runs a voting rights hotline at 1-800-253-3931. The American Civil Liberties Union runs a nonpartisan hotline at 1-866-OUR-VOTE.When will we know results?Votes cast in person on Tuesday will be counted by that night, though state laws vary for when election workers can start counting mail-in ballots. If a race turns out to be lopsided, a winner could be declared soon after the polls close. Be prepared to wait until late Tuesday night — or beyond — if it is a tight contest. More

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      In Japan Elections, Rural Voters Count More Than Those in Big Cities

      by

      The disproportionate weight of rural voters in Japan gives sparsely populated parts of the country more representation — and more government largess — than urban areas, perpetuating what critics call an unfair system.CHIZU, Japan — The mountain village of Chizu explains a lot about how one party has kept a virtual lock on power in Japan for close to seven decades.The village, in western Japan, has long been in decline. Its population has dwindled to 6,600 people, close to half of them elderly. The obstetrics ward at the hospital closed more than 15 years ago. The once-dominant forestry industry has shriveled, and a year-end fair is no longer held.Yet last year, backed by a large dollop of central government funding, the village built a 12,000-square-foot library with a sizable children’s section. It erected a new nursery school in 2017, and the middle school underwent a complete renovation two years earlier. Construction workers constantly upgrade a sparsely traveled highway into the village. As voters prepare to select members of Parliament in a national election on Sunday, the residents of Chizu are acutely cognizant of the forces behind this largess. In Japan, rural votes count for more than urban ones, giving less-populated areas like Chizu a disproportionately large number of seats in Parliament, and more chances to register their concerns with national politicians.Chizu’s upgraded middle school.Shiho Fukada for The New York TimesThis structure plays to the advantage of the conservative Liberal Democratic Party, which has governed Japan for all but four years since 1955. The party is expected to eke out a majority in the parliamentary election, partly on the strength of support from the rural areas showered with taxpayer money.In some ways, the power of Japan’s rural population parallels the political landscape in the United States, where each state has two senators regardless of population size — giving the Republican Party an outsized advantage because of its dominance of rural states.In Chizu, the nexus between political representation and access to public coffers is unmistakable. Because its residents are represented by a heavyweight member of the L.D.P. in Parliament, “we can get sufficient government aid,” said Chizu’s mayor, Hideo Kaneko, 68, in an interview in his renovated office.Chizu is in Tottori, Japan’s least populated prefecture. In the district that includes Chizu, the member of Parliament represents fewer than half the number of voters served by the lower house lawmaker in Tokyo’s most densely populated district.Critics say such disparities, which are common in rural communities, are fundamentally at odds with the democratic principle of “one person, one vote” and have skewed Japan’s politics and domestic priorities.A campaign poster of Shigeru Ishiba, a politician in the Liberal Democratic Party in Chizu, who represents the district.Shiho Fukada for The New York TimesAt a time when an increasing proportion of the Japanese population is concentrated in urban centers, “Japan’s policies are focused on rural areas,” said Junichiro Wada, a political economist at Yokohama City University.Besides producing high agricultural subsidies, more hospital beds or smaller class sizes in rural constituencies, the voting system can nudge political debates toward policies opposed by the majority.Because rural voters skew older and lean conservative, said Yusaku Horiuchi, a professor of government and Japanese studies at Dartmouth College, they tend to elect politicians — often from the L.D.P. — who maintain the status quo.So, for example, although the bulk of the Japanese public favors changing a law that stipulates all married couples must share a surname, rural voters are more likely to support keeping the law as it is. “If the voter malapportionment is solved,” Mr. Horiuchi said, “urban voices will be heard.”Hideo Kaneko, 68-year-old mayor of Chizu, likes the status quo because it favors villages like his.Shiho Fukada for The New York TimesAdvocates for rural areas say that if representation were allocated strictly by population, Japan’s remote areas might deteriorate further, an argument that some political scientists agree has merit.Given the connection between representation and public funding, said Yuko Kasuya, a professor of comparative politics at Keio University in Tokyo, “one counterargument would be that, OK, you might have a very efficient, equal distribution of subsidies, but that would mean rural areas do not have roads, do not have shopping malls and do not have basic facilities.”Still, Japan’s courts, when presented with legal challenges to the malapportionment, have been narrowing the disparities in recent decades.Hidetoshi Masunaga, a lawyer who has led the court fight, argues that “building an election system that can properly reflect the will of the people is an urgent task.” Yet he said urban voters who might stand to gain from changes to the system are often unaware of the electoral inequities. “People don’t know,” Mr. Masunaga said, “so people don’t think it’s unfair.”One night this week in the Adachi ward of Tokyo, the most densely populated district in the country, few residents seemed interested in either of two candidates — one from the Liberal Democratic Party and another from the opposition Constitutional Democratic Party — who were campaigning near train stations.Mr. Ishiba of the Liberal Democratic Party, right, bowing to residents of Tottori prefecture during the election campaign. Shiho Fukada for The New York TimesYuta Murakami, 36, an accountant for a cosmetics distributor, said that he was aware of the differences between urban and rural districts but that he was more concerned about low voter turnout in Tokyo.“The bigger issue is just getting people to go to the polls,” Mr. Murakami said after he had given the opposition candidate a fist bump outside a supermarket.In the last election for the lower house of Parliament, in 2017, less than half of registered voters in the Adachi district voted. In Chizu, 63 percent cast votes.People are protective of their voting rights in Chizu. Many residents feel a personal connection to Shigeru Ishiba, a former defense and agriculture minister who has represented Tottori Prefecture in the lower house for 35 years and who grew up in a town close to Chizu.“We expect so much of him and rely on him,” said Satoko Yamane, 62, the owner of a clothing store featuring racks full of knitwear for women of a certain age. “Rural people have their own issues that urban people don’t understand. Even if the population is small, our voices should be heard.”Yoshiichi Osaka, 85, a barber, at his shop in Chizu.Shiho Fukada for The New York TimesAt an evening campaign stop last week in Yonago, one of Tottori’s larger cities, Mr. Ishiba stood atop a white van and addressed a group of about 40 people in the rain.“Japan should not be a place where the population keeps declining and people only move to Tokyo,” Mr. Ishiba shouted. “We need to maximize the powers of agriculture, fishery, forestry, tourism, service industries, and small and medium size companies in this area.”The region has already lost a representative in the upper house of Parliament, after Tottori Prefecture merged with neighboring Shimane under a 2015 redistricting plan that assigned one lawmaker to both prefectures.In the lower house, two lawmakers still represent Tottori. At one time, recalled Yoshiichi Osaka, 85, a barber who still gives daily haircuts in Chizu, four lawmakers from Tottori served in the Diet, as Japan’s Parliament is known. “It was good to have four places to go when we wanted to ask for help,” Mr. Osaka said.Pork barrel politics helped when Chizu wanted to rebuild its middle school and Mr. Ishiba introduced Chizu leaders to senior Agriculture Ministry officials in charge of approving national grants.Asami Kagohara, 25, left, chatting with other mothers at the spacious new Chizu public library.Shiho Fukada for The New York TimesThe $21 million upgrade gave the 134 students enrolled in the middle school a computer lab, tennis courts, a music room stocked with instruments, two courtyards and a gym with four basketball hoops and a large stage. On a recent afternoon, ninth graders rehearsing for a choral recital were dwarfed by the ample space and vaulted wood ceilings in the gym.A handful of newcomers, too, have benefited from generous government subsidies. Itaru and Mariko Watanabe, originally from Tokyo, moved to Chizu in 2015 to start a bakery, brewery and cafe in an abandoned nursery school building amid rice paddies on the edge of town.Mr. Watanabe, 50, said government grants covered half of their machinery costs, and now Ms. Watanabe, 43, and two other business partners are converting an elementary school next door into a hotel, with public money footing the renovation bill.Ms. Watanabe said she had noticed a sense of groupthink in local voting patterns. “The people who were born and raised here have connections with relatives or other residents,” Ms. Watanabe said, and they tend to vote in tandem.On a recent morning at the newly built library, Asami Kagohara, 25, a single mother of a 5-month-old son she was rocking in a carrier on her chest, said she and her parents always voted together — for Mr. Ishiba.“I feel like he protects us,” Ms. Kagohara said.Motoko Rich and Makiko Inoue reported from Chizu, and Hikari Hida from Tokyo. More

    • 138 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      Japan’s Communists Are Hardly Radical, but Make a Handy Election Target

      by

      They have minimal support in polls. But by teaming up with other opposition parties for the first time, they have been made a boogeyman by the unpopular party in power.TOKYO — The Japan Communist Party is the oldest political party in the country. It’s the largest nonruling Communist party in the world. It’s harshly critical of China. And the Japanese authorities list it, along with ISIS and North Korea, as a threat to national security.To many in Japan, that comparison seems exaggerated. The party, which long ago abandoned Marx and Lenin and never really had time for Stalin or Mao, is about as radical as a beige cardigan: antiwar, pro-democracy, pro-economic equality.But that hasn’t stopped it from becoming a primary target of Japan’s dominant political force, the Liberal Democratic Party, ahead of parliamentary elections on Sunday that will help set the country’s path out of the pandemic.Though clocking in at only 3 percent support in the polls, the Communists have become a handy boogeyman after teaming up with Japan’s leading opposition parties for the first time in an effort to dethrone the L.D.P. The Communists agreed to withdraw their candidates from several districts to avoid splitting the liberal vote.The conservative Liberal Democrats, who have governed almost continuously since the end of World War II, face little risk of losing power. But with their popularity sagging amid a weak economy and lingering questions over their handling of the coronavirus, they have tried to change the subject by painting the vote as a choice between democratic rule and Communist infiltration.“The Communist Party’s strategy is to get one foot in the door,” Taro Kono, the L.D.P.’s public affairs chief, told voters during a campaign stop. “Then they wrench it open and take over the house,” he added.Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, center, appears with leaders of other political parties during a debate in Tokyo this month. The conservative Liberal Democrats have painted this weekend’s vote as a choice between democratic rule and Communist infiltration.Pool photo by Issei KatoThe Japan Communist Party, founded in 1922, has long provoked government animosity. It vigorously opposed Japan’s military aggression before and during World War II, and the Japanese secret police persecuted and imprisoned Communists through the conflict’s end.In the 1950s and ’60s, the Liberal Democrats — aided by the C.I.A. — carried out heavy-handed crackdowns on the group, which briefly flirted with political violence and became a rallying point for anti-American student protests.Despite its name, the J.C.P. has largely abandoned its roots in favor of its own homegrown ideology. It broke with the Soviet Union and China in the 1960s and has recently become one of Beijing’s most vocal Japanese critics, denouncing its neighbor for following the path of “hegemony” and violating human rights in Hong Kong and Xinjiang. When the Chinese Communist Party celebrated its 100th anniversary this year, the J.C.P. was the only major Japanese party not to send congratulations.Still, Japan’s National Police Agency has continued to treat the group as a menace. In its annual report on threats to the nation, it lumps the J.C.P. in with the Islamic State, North Korea and Aum Shinrikyo, the Japanese cult that killed 13 and injured thousands during a 1995 nerve-gas attack on the Tokyo subway.The Japan Communists, the police note, are rapidly aging, losing their financial resources — mostly generated by subscriptions to their newspaper, Akahata, or Red Flag — and are having difficulty attracting new members.The agency is not clear about what actual threat the group poses. It does note that the Communists were planning to join other opposition parties to challenge the L.D.P., and that they had “added ‘gender equality’ and ‘a nuclear-power-free Japan’” to their platform. (The J.C.P. runs more female candidates than nearly any other Japanese party.)Stores in Tokyo that have been shuttered because of the pandemic. The weak economy and the country’s Covid response have eroded the popularity of the Liberal Democrats.James Whitlow Delano for The New York TimesBoth of those initiatives are opposed to some extent by the Liberal Democrats — who, for example, have rejected legislation to allow women to keep their last names after marriage — even though they are popular with the general public.But those are not among the top issues for voters in the coming election. Their priorities are clear: keeping the coronavirus in check and putting the pandemic-ravaged economy back on track. Neither of these are necessarily winning issues for the L.D.P., which, though unlikely to lose, faces a strong risk of emerging from the election seriously weakened.Japan is reporting just a few hundred Covid-19 cases each day, and vaccination numbers have surpassed those of most other countries, despite a slow start. Nevertheless, there is a sense that the governing party mismanaged the crisis, fumbling the national vaccine rollout and delaying the country’s recovery. Stories of coronavirus patients dying at home despite ample supplies of hospital beds have further hardened public opinion.Current economic policies, which have failed to lift the country out of stagnation, are also unpopular — so much so that Fumio Kishida, who became prime minister this month after winning an L.D.P. leadership election, ran against them. Mr. Kishida promised that he would confront growing inequality through a (very socialist-sounding) program of wealth redistribution.He has since walked back those promises and looks set to continue his predecessors’ policies largely unchanged.The threat that the Japan Communist Party poses to the L.D.P. may come not from its size — the Communists have never gained more than 13 percent of the vote in a lower house election — but from its members’ dedication. The J.C.P., which has a highly organized base, could play a big role in drawing votes to the opposition, said Tomoaki Iwai, a professor of political science at Nihon University.A vigil in Tokyo during a July protest on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China. The Japan Communist Party has denounced China over its crackdowns on human rights in Hong Kong and Xinjiang.Philip Fong/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“It’s an organization that has the power to gather ballots” he said.In focusing attention on the Japan Communists, the L.D.P. and its governing partner, Komeito, are betting that voters’ distaste for big “C” communism and fear of a rising China will drive them away from the opposition coalition, said Taku Sugawara, an independent political scientist.“Until recently, as far as the L.D.P. was concerned, the Communists were just a group that got in the way of the other opposition parties,” he said. “But now that they’re clearly a threat, they’ve become a prominent target of criticism.”Although there is widespread consensus in Japan that Beijing’s growing power poses a threat to regional stability, the L.D.P. and J.C.P. are split over how to deal with it.The Liberal Democrats have called for doubling military spending, increasing defense cooperation with the United States, and changing Japan’s pacifist constitution to give it, among other things, the ability to carry out first strikes against adversaries that threaten national security.The Japan Communists, however, prefer a diplomatic approach and are strongly opposed to the substantial American military presence in Japan, a position that makes it an outlier among Japanese political parties.The Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in Ginowan, Okinawa, Japan. The Japan Communist Party is strongly opposed to the American military presence in the country, which makes it an outlier among Japanese political parties.Carl Court/Getty ImagesDuring a recent rally in front of the bustling Shinjuku station in central Tokyo, candidates for Komeito warned a small group of potential voters that the differing views of the J.C.P. and its political partners on national defense would make it impossible for them to govern competently.(The hawkish L.D.P. and its dovish coalition partner have themselves long been at odds over whether to increase military spending or alter Japan’s constitution to remove its prohibition against waging war. And Komeito is notorious for its reluctance to criticize Beijing.)The Japan Communists have said that their differences with other opposition parties would have no bearing on a new government. The Communists say they won’t seek any role if the opposition topples the L.D.P.But it’s hard to say what would actually happen if the opposition somehow won power, Mr. Iwai, the political science professor, said.None of the coalition members “actually think they’re going to win,” he said. So when it comes to discussions of what’s next, “No one’s thought that far.” More