The Banshees of Democracy

I have a new nemesis. Its name is Japanese democracy.

Well, actually, that's a bit melodramatic. I'm not waging war on the whole of Japanese democracy, just one specific aspect of it - the campaign cars.

Last month Asahi-cho officially became Echizen-cho - a new town made up of the former towns of Ota, Miyazaki, Echizen and Asahi. As a result the townspeople have to elect a new mayor, and the election campaign kicked off on Tuesday, ahead of the elections on March 13th.

Campaign rules are very strict in Japan. The campaign can only last a certain number of days, and, like Britain, television ads are not allowed. Furthermore, heavy restrictions are placed on advertising in the print media, and door-to-door campaigning is strictly forbidden. The rules are designed so that candidates with lots of funding won't gain an undue advantage - kind of the opposite of the full frontal media assault you see in the American presidential elections.

However, it also leaves the politicians with a problem - how can they promote themselves if they can't advertise? The answer is this:




The Campaign Car. Each candidate is allowed one campaign car, mounted with enormously powerful loudspeakers, which constantly blare out the candidate's name and policies in the most irritating, sing-song voice you can imagine.

And they're driving me insane.

The cars are allowed to roam the streets from 8am to 8pm, playing the same tape loop over and over again at window rattling volume. I'm in the school staff room at the moment, and I can clearly hear a campaign car on the other side of town - it's crazy. Technically the cars aren't allowed to go near schools or hospitals, but it doesn't seem to matter - you can hear them wherever they go. The high school entrance exams were on Tuesday, so the poor kids had to put up with all this banshee wailing whilst they were trying to take their tests.

I like the idea of banning television advertising in elections, but at least you can turn the TV off if you want to. It's getting to the point where I'm tempted to put a brick through the windscreen of the next campaign car I see.

One thing I like about the elections though is the candidates' bases. There are four main candidates, and they have their campaign bases in a row along the main street in Asahi, each one surrounded by coloured flags. So there's the blue team, the green team, the yellow team and the pink team - kind of like sports day for politicians. Plus each team is trying to outdo the other in various comical ways. As I was driving to school the other day, I say the blue team lined up in a row next to all their flags. At first I wondered what they were doing, then I realised they were bowing to every single car that drove past. Classy.

Now if only there was more of that, and less of the caterwauling banshee cars, I'd be a lot happier.

If you're interested, there's a really good article on Japanese elections here.

The pink team's base.


The blue team's base. You can tell they mean business, because they've hired a Portakabin.