While the Cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe enjoys high support rates, hovering around 70 percent, its very legitimacy is being questioned.
More than a dozen high courts have handed down rulings confirming that vote-value disparities tainted the Dec. 16 general election that returned Abe's Liberal Democratic Party to power. Notably, the Hiroshima High Court ruled last month that the results of two electoral districts were invalid, the first time this has happened.
On April 12, the LDP and its junior coalition partner, New Komeito, submitted a bill aimed at rectifying the disparities by taking one Lower House seat away each from five prefectures with relatively low populations.
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