Katsuya Okada
The main opposition Democratic Party (DPJ), consisting of former LDP members and liberals, saw the election as a chance to end the LDP's nearly continuous 50-year control of the government and to start reforms of government spending and employees. Many analysts believed that the DPJ would be less beholden to special interests than the entrenched LDP, and a change of government was vital to lead to a true democracy in Japan. On 10 August, Katsuya Okada, the leader of the DPJ, said that he would resign if the DPJ failed to take over the government, paralleling Koizumi's stated intention.