Japanese Prime Minister was dealt with uncertainty after his ruling coalition suffered a jaw-dropping defeat in upper house election on Monday. While he has vowed to still stay in office, shifting the focus back to awaited interactions with his US counterpart Donald Trump and a subsequent trade deal, a far-right politician has already stolen his thunder.
Trump-inspired Japan’s far-right politician on the rise
Taking a page out of Trump’s ‘America First’ agenda, Sohei Kamiya, the 47-year-old far-right Sanseito party’s ‘Japanese First’ leader’s cries gained traction this election season in the Asian country. “I think Japan needs a political movement like ‘America First,'” he said during an interview. “But not the same leadership style — Trump is too self-centred for Japan.”
Kamiya’s Trump-style ideology challenges Japan’s long-governing Liberal Democratic Party. With PM Shigeru Ishiba losing out on approval ratings, and voters evidently swinging right, crowds of relatively younger people joined in to attend the far-right politician’s rallies in the country. His nationalist agenda, much like Trump, hits it out against globalists and foreigners.
Despite not being on the ballot himself this year, his presence has undoubtedly destabilised Ishiba’s prominence further. Having founded the populist party in focus due to the current election wave, Kamiya was elected to a six-year term in 2022, according to The New York Times. Some are even already envisioning him as the one who could take over Japan’s prime ministership in the future.
Given his firm belief that Japan has prioritised the interests of foreigners over its own people, the Self-Defense Force reservist once warned in a speech, “Under globalism, multinational companies have changed Japan’s policies for their own purpose. If we fail to resist this foreign pressure, Japan will become a colony!”
Sohei Kamiya’s anti-immigration views despite his own past as an exchange student
Additionally, Kamiya’s ideology shaped by the younger people’s perspective asserted that the 10% national consumption tax in place to help out costs of Japan’s increasing retiree population had only thrust more economic burden on the working-class youth. People from the age bracket have since evidently been won over by the 47-year-old’s firm beliefs on the matter, which were influenced by his own experience as an exchange student in Canada. At the time, he helped his father run the family supermarket, which ultimately went bankrupt.
Sohei Kamiya founded Sanseito Party
Later on, he got swept into local politics and became a member of the Liberal Democratic Party, which he now stands on the other side of. He finally quit the governing unit as he felt it was excessively bent on fund-raising above all else.
In 2020, he set the ground running for a new far-right party, Sanseito, without relying on high-profile donors. He rather put his faith in his and the party’s supporters to fund the political venture by becoming paying subscribers on YouTube during peak COVID-19 pandemic.
The conservative firebrand even worked as an English teacher at one point. Having been slammed for what many believe to be his xenophobic policies, Kamiya defended his ‘Japanese First’ foundation after the election vote. He told Nippon Television, “The phrase was meant to express rebuilding Japanese people’s livelihoods by resisting globalism. I am not saying we should completely ban foreigners or that every foreigner should get out of Japan.”