Results of the 2012 Japanese general election (Shikoku proportional representation block) Results of the 2012 Japanese general election (Shikoku proportional representation block) The Shikoku proportional representation block was one of 11 multi-member districts (and 311 districts overall) that were contested at the general election for the House of Representatives in the Japanese National Diet on 16 December 2012. Six seats were available for election via open party lists. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) won the election in a landslide, which returned former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to power. In the Shikoku PR block, the LDP won two of the six seats with 30.7% of the vote. Voters who participated in the
Shinzō Abe Communist and Social Democratic parties walked out of the vote in protest at what they said was the government's move to force the bills through without sufficient debate and ignore "responsible opposition parties". Abe countered by arguing that the bills had been debated for "as many as 113 hours" before the vote. While common practice in many other parliamentary democracies, a government using its majority to "railroad" controversial bills though the Diet in the face of political and public opposition is a subject of criticism in Japan. As a result of these moves, Abe faced a public backlash, and opinion