The political tug-of-war over the government's postal privatization plan continued Thursday as a senior Liberal Democratic Party official gathered 95 LDP Diet members for a protest meeting.
The gathering was the second organized by Tamisuke Watanuki, a former House of Representatives speaker who is seen as the symbolic leader of those who oppose the privatization drive of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, the LDP president.
In the first meeting last month, Watanuki brought together 74 LDP lawmakers, and Diet sources said the increased number at Thursday's meeting could put more pressure on Koizumi's Cabinet to rethink the privatization plan, which runs against vested interests held by LDP members in the state-run postal system.