Overview

• Taro Aso is expected to call for advancing the LDP presidential election at his faction’s September 3 study session, according to people close to him.
• Aso, who leads the party’s remaining major faction, does not intend to bind the roughly 40 lawmakers in his group to a unified stance.
• Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba acknowledged responsibility for the Upper House defeat but said he will make a decision on his future at an appropriate time, declining to set a timetable.
• Secretary-General Yutaka Moriyama tendered his resignation, and Shunichi Suzuki, Itsunori Onodera, and Seiji Kihara also expressed intentions to step down from party posts.
• Under party procedures, Diet members and prefectural chapters will be surveyed on September 8, and if a majority backs acceleration the vote will be moved up, as the party’s postmortem cites unresolved “politics and money” issues as a major factor in the loss.