Well, depends how who defines ‘Liberal Democrat/Democrat’...
Going by what my friends at the Honda plant say about their government, not what is described in the media.
In that case, the LDP didn’t came to power only in 1993 (if anything they lost it briefly between 1993 and 1994 to the JRP). The LDP has been THE Party in power pretty much the entire post-war period from 1950’s til today, with very few short years out of power here and there.
Or to put it another way, there has never been a *Conservative* Party holding power in Japan after end of WW2. Since WW2 all the way up to today Japan has ALWAYS been a far more Socialist / Social Liberal / Mercantilist economy than the U.S.