Neither the Constitution nor the contentious security laws enacted last year should become key issues in the Upper House election, said Natsuo Yamaguchi, president of Komeito, the junior partner in the ruling coalition.

"A nationwide debate over the issue of constitutional revision is so immature at this point that I don't think voters should be pressed to choose what they want to do with" the supreme law, Yamaguchi said in an interview with domestic media outlets last week at party headquarters in Tokyo.

The comments by Yamaguchi, who insisted the issue shouldn't dominate conversation between candidates and voters ahead of the pivotal July 10 election, dovetail with the stance being taken by the conservative Liberal Democratic Party, which is trying to avoid undercutting voter support.

The election could give the ruling coalition the two-thirds majority it needs in the upper chamber to initiate a national referendum on amending, rather than reinterpreting, the Constitution and war-renouncing Article 9.

In its manifesto unveiled earlier this month, the LDP only made a tangential mention of its willingness to revise the Constitution, and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been careful to avoid bringing the sensitive issue to the fore in campaign speeches, apparently out of fear of confirming voters' fears.

Yamaguchi said his party, long backed by many of the nation's lay Buddhists, supports the idea of amending the 69-year-old Constitution, which was drafted by the United States in the aftermath of Japan's defeat in World War II.

Although Yamaguchi said Article 9, recently circumvented by a divisive reinterpretation of the Constitution, should be preserved, he also said new sections to protect the people's privacy and right to a healthy environment should be incorporated into the national charter.

As for the security laws, Yamaguchi claimed that since they have already been enacted, they, too, should not be an election issue.

The laws allow the Self-Defense Forces to fight alongside the United States in situations involving the use of collective defense, or coming to the aid of allies under attack even when Japan is not attacked. Critics view the laws as an echo of the militarism that led Japan to ruin in World War II.

"After being enacted last year, the laws never became a focus of debate during this past Diet session," Yamaguchi said.

Although opposition parties such as the Democratic Party and the Japanese Communist Party in February submitted bills to repeal the laws, neither the ruling bloc nor the opposition camp as a whole appeared willing to embrace the topic again, he said.

"I have to say it's unrealistic to make the laws an election issue," he said.

Asked about the prime minister's Abenomics policy, Yamaguchi said he believes the economic program has "made great progress" in pulling Japan out of its decades-long stagnation.

On the other hand, he admitted there is still room for improvement, adding: "There are people who still haven't felt the effect of Abenomics. Our challenge is to give the program further momentum to maximize its fruition."