Tamaki Yuichiro, Japan’s populist upstart who wants to be prime minister

THE IMAGE Tamaki Yuichiro wants to convey is of upward mobility. His campaign poster shows him grinning against a vivid orange backdrop, arms extended and fingers pointing skyward. The slogan beneath is hardly revolutionary: “Increase take-home pay.” But Mr Tamaki has turned this into a rallying-cry among younger voters.

The 56-year-old leader of the Democratic Party For the People (DPFP), an opposition upstart, is disrupting Japan’s ossified politics. In last year’s lower-house election, Mr Tamaki’s party quadrupled its number of seats to become the fourth-largest force. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was left leading a minority government, and needing Mr Tamaki’s help to pass legislation. On July 20th voters will elect a new upper house, where the LDP and its junior coalition partner, Komeito, are at risk of losing their majority. That would lead to a shake-up. Mr Tamaki hopes to become prime minister at the head of a new coalition.

The LDP has long dominated Japanese politics. It has governed almost uninterrupted for seven decades. Its main centre-left rival, the Constitutional Democratic Party, is too feeble to pose a serious challenge. It is still haunted by the failures of its predecessor, the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), during the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown in 2011.

A messier era of politics has begun. The LDP-led government is shaky and the prime minister, Ishiba Shigeru, is floundering. Mr Tamaki has emerged as an appealing alternative, drawing support from unaffiliated voters and disillusioned moderates. He considers himself “neither left nor right” but a champion of Japan’s young and working-age population. Their prospects are bleak: disposable incomes have barely increased in decades. Mr Tamaki criticises Japan’s “silver democracy”: over-65s make up nearly 30% of the population and vote in greater numbers. This, plus a seniority-based culture in politics and workplaces, often sidelines younger people. Mr Tamaki calls them the “forgotten people”. One recent poll showed his DPFP to be more popular than the LDP among voters under 40.

Mr Tamaki grew up among rice fields in Kagawa, a rural prefecture on the southern island of Shikoku. He is a former track athlete and, by his own estimation, a fine singer (he boasts of once being scouted at karaoke by a talent agency). He had the early career of a future member of the elite: after studying law at the University of Tokyo he joined the Ministry of Finance and later spent a year at Harvard. He first ran for office in 2005 with the DPJ. In 2018 he broke away to co-found the DPFP.

Mr Tamaki is openly ambitious, not shy of voicing his desire to become prime minister. He also styles himself an economic-policy otaku, or obsessive. His signature policies include slashing the consumption tax—a position now shared by most opposition parties—and introducing “education bonds” to fund spending on children and social programmes. He is charismatic, friendly and down-to-earth. His social-media savvy sets him apart from Japan’s traditional, buttoned-up political class. His Instagram reels mix bite-sized policy explainers with lighthearted posts—about food, for instance. His parliamentary office has an award from YouTube recognising the success of his videos. His party’s channel now boasts nearly twice as many subscribers as the LDP’s.

Mr Tamaki represents a distinctively Japanese kind of populism, built on social-media performance and fiscal promises. His social-spending proposals are popular but have been dismissed by LDP members as reckless. The Japanese bond market has been uneasy recently, rattled by politicians’ pre-election promises of fiscal stimulus. The country’s net public debt stands at 130% of GDP. But Mr Tamaki, like many others, remains undaunted.

He has suffered setbacks. The biggest blow came last year, when a tabloid revealed he was having an affair with a former swimsuit model (he was suspended for three months). Later, it emerged that he had tried to make her one of his party’s candidates for office. He was attacked more recently for attempting to field another controversial candidate, who had been accused of infidelity.

Meanwhile, another disrupter threatens to overshadow him. The Do It Yourself Party (Sanseito), a hard-right outfit founded just five years ago, is rising in the polls with its “Japanese First” messaging. Immigration, long a fringe issue in Japanese politics, has moved to the centre ahead of the upper-house election. The number of foreign workers in Japan has quadrupled since 2008 to 2m, though it really needs more, not fewer. The LDP appears to be under pressure to act: it recently announced the creation of a cross-agency “control tower” to oversee foreign residents.

Mr Tamaki, though occasionally labelled as “right-leaning”, has resisted the xenophobic impulse. He is pragmatic on foreign affairs and supports building up the armed forces in the face of increasing threats from China and North Korea. But he has progressive positions on social issues; he favours, for example, allowing married couples to retain separate surnames. He sees economic malaise as the true source of Japanese voters’ frustrations. “People feel left behind and are starting to blame foreigners,” he said in a recent interview. “That’s exactly why we need better domestic policy—to energise Japan.” ■