Opposition parties are seeking to bolster their presence in local assemblies, raising the possibility that unified local elections in spring next year will be highly competitive.

The Democratic Party for the People (DPP) and Sanseito in particular plan to actively field candidates in the local races.

After their lackluster gains in February’s general election, the two parties are determined that their local organizations need to be bolstered so that they do not have to rely on support from unaffiliated voters.

“We need to put up at least 850 candidates,” DPP leader Yuichiro Tamaki told reporters in Kokubunji, Tokyo, on Saturday, referring to the local elections. “We will begin efforts in earnest.”

At a party convention on April 5, the DPP set a goal of increasing its number of local assembly members from around 340 currently to 700 in the unified races. The party will set candidate targets for each prefectural chapter, with efforts focused on fielding candidates in areas where there are currently no DPP assembly members.

Senior DPP members are continuing their nationwide touring efforts to find potential candidates in various areas.

Sanseito aims to put up 600 candidates in the unified local elections and win 500 seats. It also plans to actively field candidates for races leading up to the unified polls.

The party has a goal of more than doubling its number of local assembly members from a little over 200 at present. It hopes to secure 300 candidates by the Golden Week holiday period through early May.

The two parties believe that beefing up local political bases is crucial to expanding their influence.

Both parties fell short of their targets in the February election for the House of Representatives. Sanseito increased its number of seats to 15, while the DPP was only able to expand its seat count by one.

The unified local elections will be followed by the election for the House of Councilors, the upper parliamentary chamber, in 2028. “We will win a seat in Hokkaido in the Upper House race no matter what,” Sanseito chief Sohei Kamiya said in a street speech on Saturday in Sapporo.

Team Mirai, which made significant gains in the Lower House election, is taking a cautious approach in considering how many candidates to put up. “We will contest races in which we have high possibilities of winning,” party head Takahiro Anno said in an interview.

The Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, Komeito and the Centrist Reform Alliance, the latter of which was formed by Lower House lawmakers from the former two parties, reached a basic agreement this month on collaboration in the unified local elections. They plan to start the candidate nomination process as early…