Dilemma for Abe if Constitution wins Peace Prize

Michio Hamaji voted for Shinzo Abe's Liberal Democratic Party at the general election in December 2012 but there has been a twist since then. Hamaji, a Japanese businessman, 72, supports Abe's economic policies, dubbed Abenomics, but does not hold with Abe's vision of changing the country's Constitution.

Early this year Hamaji initiated a campaign to protect Japan's Constitution and came up with the idea of nominating it for the Nobel Peace Prize. Japan's Constitution, which came into effect in 1947, formally renounces war and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes.

"If the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2012 to the European Union, why not Japan's Constitution; the world's only pacifist one?" Hamaji said.