Shinzo Abe, the current Prime Minister of Japan, has been a vocal proponent of revising Article 96, stating that "It's unfair that just more than one-third of lawmakers could block revisions even if 50 percent or more of the public want to amend the Constitution".[9] Given that his Liberal Democratic Party controls both Houses of the National Diet (for the first time in nearly a decade), political pundits say that he has a fair chance to succeed.[10] However, the Liberal Democratic Party's coalition partner, New Komeito, may be unwilling to support such a change,[11] and in fact, the Liberal Democratic Party appeared to drop the issue from its platform in the run up to the House of Councillors election in 2013.[12] Moreover, the Japanese population appears to be roughly divided regarding the revision of Article 96, with 42% in favor and 46% against according to a recent Mainichi Shimbun poll.[13] A separate NHK survey showed that nearly 50% of Japanese had no opinion on the subject.[14]