LDP heavyweights ousted in Japan polls

TOKYO, Aug. 30 -- Japan's electorate have booted long-established senior Liberal Democratic Party politicians in an election Sunday that saw both former Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu, former Finance Minister Shoichi Nakagawa, former Defense Minister Taku Yamasaki and former Foreign Minister Taro Nakayama lose their seats, according to reports by Kyodo News and NHK.

Kaifu was prime minister between 1989 and 1991, but at the age of 78, now looks set to leave politics.

Nakagawa achieved notoriety earlier this year when he was filmed at a G-8 summit in Italy looking intoxicated. Despite accusations that he was drunk, Nakagawa claimed that he was feeling the effects of medicine he had taken for a cold.

Yamasaki is a former secretary-general of the LDP. Nakayama has been a member of Japan's parliament since 1968 and served as foreign minister in the cabinet of former Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu between 1989 and 1990.

In some good news for the LDP both former Prime Ministers Yasuo Fukuda and Shinzo Abe reclaimed their seats, as did Prime Minister Taro Aso. Shinjiro Koizumi, the son of former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi also won his seat. However, NHK reports that Aso will likely be asked to step down in the near future.