Saga 1st district

Saga 1st district is a constituency of the House of Representatives in the Diet of Japan (national legislature). It is located in Saga Prefecture and consists of Tosu, parts of Saga and Kanzaki as well as the Miyaki District. As of September 2012, 237,748 eligible voters were registered in the district.^[1]

Saga 1st district has been a swing district since its creation in 1996: it alternately elected candidates for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ)/its precursor New Frontier Party (NFP). The district is currently represented by Kazuchika Iwata (LDP), a former second-generation Saga prefectural assemblyman. In 2012, Iwata defeated Kazuhiro Haraguchi (DPJ), Minister of Internal Affairs and Communication in the Hatoyama cabinet. Haraguchi had initially won the district narrowly for the NFP in 1996 but lost it in 2000 to Takanori Sakai (LDP) who was appointed as Cabinet Office Vice Minister in the 2nd realigned Mori cabinet. In March 2003, Sakai was arrested (and later sentenced to 32 months in prison) for having received illicit corporate donations in violation of the Political Funds Control Law.^[2]^[3] Takamaro Fukuoka replaced Sakai as LDP candidate for Saga 1 in the 2003 election and lost to Haraguchi. The "postal privatization" election of 2005 gave the LDP a landslide victory, and Fukuoka beat Haraguchi despite the fact that the DPJ's opposition ally, the Social Democratic Party (SDP), unlike in previous elections did not nominate a candidate in Saga 1st district. In the landslide LDP defeat of 2009, Haraguchi won the district for the third time.

Before the 1994 electoral reform, the area had been part of Saga At-large district where five representatives were elected by single non-transferable vote.

List of Representatives

Representative		Dates	Notes
Kazuhiro Haraguchi	NFP	1996–2000	Reelected to a proportional seat in the Kyūshū bloc, joined "Voice of the People" in the NFP dissolution, merged into Minseitō, then DPJ in 1998
Takanori Sakai	LDP	2000–2003	Violation of the Political Funds Control Act, but in office until dissolution
Kazuhiro Haraguchi	DPJ	2003–2005	Reelected to a proportional seat in the Kyūshū bloc
Takamaro Fukuoka	LDP	2005–2009	Failed reelection to a proportional seat in the Kyūshū bloc; became member of the House of Councillors from Saga in the 2010 election
Kazuhiro Haraguchi	DPJ	2009–2012	Reelected to a proportional seat in the Kyūshū bloc
Kazuchika Iwata	LDP	2012–	Incumbent

Election results

2012^[4]
	Candidate	Votes	%
LDP (NK)	Kazuchika Iwata	70,547	49.2
DPJ (PNP)	Kazuhiro Haraguchi (elected by PR)	63,007	43.9
JCP	Hitoshi Ōmori	9,857	6.9

2009^[5]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	DPJ (SDP, NPP support)	Kazuhiro Haraguchi	96,618
	LDP (Kōmeitō support)	Takamaro Fukuoka	75,475
	Happiness Realization Party	Ken Koba	1,568
Turnout			175,824	74.77

2005^[6]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	LDP	Takamaro Fukuoka	84,643
	DPJ	Kazuhiro Haraguchi	75,449
	JCP	Akemi Mutō	8,029
Turnout			170,282	73.28

2003^[7]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	DPJ	Kazuhiro Haraguchi	70,271
	LDP	Takamaro Fukuoka	66,446
	SDP	Hisahiro Shibata	8,315
	JCP	Yasutoshi Kamimura	4,977
Turnout			152,297	66.13

2000^[8]
	Candidate	Votes
LDP	Takanori Sakai	70,155
DPJ	Kazuhiro Haraguchi	62,932
SDP	Katsuyō Ogata	30,018
JCP	Yasutoshi Kamimura	7,173
Liberal League	Kō Nagai	1,612

1996^[9]
	Candidate	Votes
NFP	Kazuhiro Haraguchi	62,515
LDP	Takanori Sakai	60,286
SDP	Katsuyō Ogata	27,514
JCP	Yasutoshi Kamimura	7,670
Liberal League	Takashi Kimura	2,493

References

↑ Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC): 平成24年9月2日現在選挙人名簿及び在外選挙人名簿登録者数>選挙区ごとの選挙人名簿及び在外選挙人名簿登録者数等 (Japanese)
↑ The Japan Times, June 27, 2003: Sakai, cohort plead not guilty to defrauding state
↑ The Japan Times, March 23, 2007: Prosecutors drive ex-labor minister to penitentiary
↑ 総選挙2012>開票結果　小選挙区　佐賀. Yomiuri Shimbun (in Japanese). Retrieved 2013-06-05.
↑ 衆議院>第45回衆議院議員選挙>佐賀県>佐賀1区. ザ･選挙 (in Japanese). JANJAN. Retrieved 2010-01-07. External link in |work= (help)
↑ 衆議院>第44回衆議院議員選挙>佐賀県>佐賀1区. ザ･選挙 (in Japanese). JANJAN. Retrieved 2009-12-30. External link in |work= (help)
↑ 衆議院 >第43回衆議院議員選挙 >佐賀県>佐賀1区. ザ･選挙 (in Japanese). JANJAN. Retrieved 2009-12-30. External link in |work= (help)
↑ 衆議院>第42回衆議院議員選挙>佐賀県>佐賀1区. ザ･選挙 (in Japanese). JANJAN. Retrieved 2009-12-30. External link in |work= (help)
↑ 衆議院>第41回衆議院議員選挙 >佐賀県>佐賀1区. ザ･選挙 (in Japanese). JANJAN. Retrieved 2010-01-07. External link in |work= (help)

Single-member districts and proportional representation "blocks" for the Japanese House of Representatives since 1996

Speaker of the House of Representatives of Japan: Tadamori Ōshima, Aomori 3 Vice Speaker of the House of Representatives of Japan: Tatsuo Kawabata, Kinki PR

Hokkaidō proportional representation block - 8 seats	Hokkaidō 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (7) 8 9 10 11 12 (13)

Tōhoku proportional representation block - 14 seats	Aomori 1 2 3 4 Iwate 1 2 3 4 Miyagi 1 2 3 4 5 6 Akita 1 2 3 Yamagata 1 2 3 (4) Fukushima 1 2 3 4 5

Kitakantō proportional representation block - 20 seats	Ibaraki 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Tochigi 1 2 3 4 5 Gunma 1 2 3 4 5 Saitama 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Minamikantō proportional representation block - 22 seats	Chiba 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Kanagawa 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Yamanashi 1 2 (3)

Tokyo proportional representation block - 17 seats	Tokyo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

Hokurikushin'etsu proportional representation block - 11 seats	Niigata 1 2 3 4 5 6 Toyama 1 2 3 Ishikawa 1 2 3 Fukui 1 2 (3) Nagano 1 2 3 4 5

Tōkai proportional representation block - 21 seats	Gifu 1 2 3 4 5 Shizuoka 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 (9) Aichi 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Mie 1 2 3 4 5

Kinki proportional representation block - 29 seats	Shiga 1 2 3 4 Kyoto 1 2 3 4 5 6 Osaka 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Hyōgo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Nara 1 2 3 4 Wakyama 1 2 3

Chūgoku proportional representation block - 11 seats	Tottori 1 2 Shimane 1 2 (3) Okayama 1 2 3 4 5 Hiroshima 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Yamaguchi 1 2 3 4

Shikoku proportional representation block - 6 seats	Tokushima 1 2 (3) Kagawa 1 2 3 Ehime 1 2 3 4 Kōchi 1 2 (3)

Kyūshū proportional representation block - 21 seats	Fukuoka 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Saga 1 2 (3) Nagasaki 1 2 3 4 Kumamoto 1 2 3 4 5 Ōita 1 2 3 (4) Miyazaki 1 2 3 Kagoshma 1 2 3 4 5 Okinawa 1 2 3 4

(in parentheses): districts eliminated in the 2002 and 2013 reapportionments

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 8/23/2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.