The approval rate for Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s cabinet slipped to 55.8 percent, the lowest point since she took office last October, a Kyodo News poll showed Sunday, amid lingering uncertainty in the resource-poor country over the economic fallout from the Middle East conflict.
In the weekend telephone survey, which took place after the United States and Iran reached a preliminary peace deal under which Tehran agreed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, 54.7 percent of respondents saw no need to send the Japanese Self-Defense Forces to the key waterway to help ensure the safe passage of commercial vessels, while 36.6 percent thought otherwise.
Minesweeping operations are seen as essential to restore normal shipping traffic through the strait after the closure following U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran, but the SDF has restrictions on its overseas activities under Japan’s pacifist postwar Constitution.
Takaichi’s cabinet approval rate has continued to decline in recent months, falling 5.5 percentage points from the previous survey in mid-May. In May, 70.6 percent of respondents expressed concern about disrupted supplies of petroleum-derived naphtha, a raw material for plastic products.
Among those backing the cabinet, 17.4 percent said in the latest poll that they have confidence in the prime minister, down from 20.6 percent, and 13.6 percent said they have expectations for economic policies, dropping from 17.2 percent.
The Cabinet disapproval rate rose 1.1 points to 27.9 percent.
With households continuing to struggle with elevated prices, the largest share of respondents, 43.9 percent, said they would support lowering the consumption tax rate on food and beverages from the current 8 percent to 1 percent if doing so would allow the measure to be introduced sooner, while 22.6 percent favored cutting the rate to zero, as pledged by the ruling parties, regardless of how long implementation may take.
The ruling coalition of Takaichi’s Liberal Democratic Party and the Japan Innovation Party pledged to freeze the 8 percent consumption tax for two years during the February general election campaign as a measure to counter inflation.
But a 1 percent plan for two years starting April 2027 has recently been proposed by the LDP’s tax policy chief, given that changing the tax rate to zero would require more time to adjust retailers’ cash register systems.
Some 29 percent of respondents in the poll dismissed the need for any food tax cut.
In parliament, Takaichi has been grilled by opposition parties over an allegation during the LDP leadership race last year that her camp created and spread videos online to smear her rivals.
While she has denied her involvement, 49.7 percent were not satisfied with the prime minister’s explanation, compared with the 38.9 percent who said the matter was sufficiently explained.
The poll, meanwhile, showed that the public was divided over a proposal to tackle the dwindling number of imperial family members by enabling certain male descendants from the former 11 collateral branches, which lost their royal status some 80 years ago, to join the imperial family, with 44 percent approving the idea and 45.4 percent opposing it.
The number of heirs eligible to take over the Chrysanthemum Throne, as well as the entire imperial family, has continued to decrease as the Imperial House Law limits heirs to a male who has an emperor on his father’s side, while female members must leave the family upon marriage to commoners.
A significant majority of 72.3 percent supported the idea to allow female members to retain their imperial status even after marrying commoners, with only 19.5 percent against it.
Among political parties, support for the LDP increased to 38.7 percent from 36.2 percent in the previous survey and that for the Japan Innovation Party fell to 4.8 percent from 6.7 percent.
The Centrist Reform Alliance, the largest opposition force in the House of Representatives, garnered support from 6.1 percent, up from 5.0 percent, while the Democratic Party for the People, also in the opposition, drew 6.6 percent, down from 6.9 percent.
About 21 percent of respondents said they did not support any political party, up from 20.2 percent.
The survey, which was conducted for two days from Saturday, called 486 randomly selected households with eligible voters and 3,367 mobile phone numbers. It yielded responses from 423 household members and 621 mobile phone users.
© KYODO
