77% of the votes for the party came from rural areas (the party had launched 32 rural and 8 urban candidates). Two of the candidates of the party were elected, Yamamoto Senji and Mizutani Chozaburo. Following the election the three proletarian parties in the assembly (the Labour-Farmer Party, the Japan Labour-Farmer Party and the Social Democratic Party) managed to form a joint parliamentary committee, in spite of their political contradictions. Dissolution With the 15 March incident, a wave of repression was directed against the leftwing in Japan. Around 1,600 persons were arrested and accused of being communist activists. The Labour-Farmer Party was banned by the Home Ministry on April 11, 1928, after accusations arose of links to the communists. Hyōgikai was banned on the same day. After the Labour-Farmer Party had been banned, the government attempted to expel its representatives from the Lower House of the Diet of Japan. However they lacked any legal basis to do so, and the two Labour-Farmer Party continued in their parliamentary functions. Yamamoto Senji, who was elected as a Labour-Farmer Party candidate for Kyoto at the first general election under universal suffrage held in February 1928, spoke in the Imperial Diet on February 8 1929, inquiring about the torture and illegal detention of prisoners by the police, who had boasted of being the "Amakasu of Showa". He was preparing his speech for the Diet in February, but was killed by a right-wing assassin at an inn in the Kanda district of Tokyo on February 29, on the same day as he had presented testified in the Diet regarding torture of prisoners. There would be several different attempts by leftists to recreate a party representing the Labour-Farmer Party legacy. Immediately after the disbanding of the Labour-Farmer Party, the Communist Party instructed its cadres to rebuild the party. The goal to achieve unification with the Japan Labour-Farmer Party was retained. A reorganization committee was formed (named the 'Committee for the Rebuilding of the Labour-Farmer Party and Preparation for New Party'). Oyama Ikou served as the chairman of the committee and Hososako as the general secretary. The committee was quickly banned by the government, but continued to function illegally. In July 1928 the Rōnō faction broke away from the committee and founded the Proletarian Masses Party. In December 1928 the Proletarian Masses Party merged with the Japan Labour-Farmer Party, forming the Japan Masses Party. In the same