1999 Tokyo gubernatorial election

Tokyo held a gubernatorial election on April 11, 1999 as part of the 14th unified local elections. Incumbent Yukio Aoshima announced that he would not seek re-election. All major candidates ran as independents but several were supported by major parties. The Liberal Democratic Party, led by Secretary General Yoshiro Mori, supported Yasushi Akashi as a compromise with coalition partner New Komeito, but local LDP legislators divided their support between candidates Ishihara, Masuzoe and Kakizawa.

Author and former Diet member Shintaro Ishihara, who had previously come in second in the 1975 gubernatorial election against incumbent governor Ryokichi Minobe,[1] won the election on a nationalist platform, saying that he would have the United States return Yokota Air Base to Japan and clarify its position on Japan's ownership of the Senkaku Islands. Akashi came in fourth, the poorest showing by an LDP-supported candidate in Tokyo history.[2]

Gubernatorial election 1999: Tokyo

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Independent	Shintarō Ishihara	1,664,558	30.47%
	DPJ, TSN, Kaikaku Club	Kunio Hatoyama	851,130	15.58%
	Independent	Yōichi Masuzoe	836,104	15.30%
	LDP, NK	Yasushi Akashi	690,308	12.63%
	JCP	Mitsuru Mikami	661,881	12.11%
	Independent	Kōji Kakizawa	632,054	11.57%
	Independent	Yoshirō Nakamatsu	100,123	1.83%
Turnout			5,510,042	57.87%	+7.2%

• Note: Excludes twelve other candidates, none of whom received more than 0.3% of total votes.

References

1. Allinson, Gary D. (1979). Suburban Tokyo: A Comparative Study in Politics and Social Change. University of California Press. p. 185.
2. Kristof, Nicholas (12 April 1999). "Nationalist Critical of U.S. Air Base Is Elected Governor of Tokyo". The New York Times. Retrieved 8 January 2014.