(Update) Japan Party Chiefs Make Pleas for Votes in Upper House Poll

   Tokyo, July 3 (Jiji Press)--Political party leaders took to the streets of Japan to call on voters for their support Thursday, which marked the start of the official campaign period for the July 20 House of Councillors election.
   "We will aim to achieve at all costs a wage growth that outpaces rising prices," Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who heads the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, said in his first stump speech for the election for the upper chamber of parliament.
   "We hope to deliver as soon as possible our (cash) handout to people who are facing financial hardships," he said in the western Japan city of Kobe, vowing to have such benefits delivered to the people "by the end of this year, and not next year."
   "Our handout is for low-income people and those raising many growing children," Ishiba said, emphasizing that such money is "definitely not for pork-barreling intentions."
   Tetsuo Saito, chief of Komeito, the junior coalition partner of the LDP, also picked Kobe to make his first street speech for the election.

(2025/07/03-16:46)

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