Officials alarmed by sliding public support for Abe

March 19, 2018

TOKYO- A sense of crisis is growing among government and ruling coalition officials in Japan, alarmed by sliding public support for the cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The decline in popularity apparently reflects a scandal over the Finance Ministry's manipulation of documents about a controversial discount sale of state-owned land to private school operator Moritomo Gakuen, once linked to the prime minister's wife, Akie.

"The document alterations have undermined public trust in the government, and I take this seriously," Abe told a parliamentary committee on Monday.

The slide in support is casting dark clouds over Abe's goals of revising the country's constitution and winning reelection as president of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in autumn, as government and coalition officials have few ideas about how to recover public support for the cabinet.

"The public is taking a stern view and the government plans to do all it can to restore public trust," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a press conference on Friday.

The comments came after a Jiji Press opinion poll showed that the approval rate for the Abe cabinet plunged 9.4 percentage points to 39.3 percent in March from the previous month. The poll was conducted between March 9 and March 12.

On March 9, Nobuhisa Sagawa, who was head of the ministry's Financial Bureau when the documents were altered, stepped down as chief of the National Tax Agency. On March 12, the ministry admitted to altering the documents.

A government official admitted that "there is no doubt that the document alteration scandal has affected" public support for the cabinet.

A source close to the prime minister said that the cabinet had managed to maintain a certain level of public support even after coming under fire over the scandal, but the government cannot be optimistic about the situation.

Opposition parties have been criticizing the government for not disclosing the document alterations even though Abe was informed of the possibility of the manipulation as early as March 6. The opposition camp is looking to find out who instructed the alterations to be made and for what purposes.

The Jiji Press poll showed an increasing number of people said they cannot trust Abe, indicating that the sliding support is traced to disgust for the cabinet itself rather than disapproval of its specific policies.

The document manipulation scandal has started affecting the course of discussions on constitutional amendments that Abe aims to put into effect by 2020.

Former LDP Secretary-General Shigeru Ishiba, one of Abe's rivals within the party, told reporters on Wednesday that the focus should be on regaining public trust rather than discussing constitutional revisions.

Kazuo Kitagawa, a senior official of Komeito, the coalition partner of the LDP, suggested at a press conference on Thursday that he saw no need to speed up talks on constitutional amendments at the moment. "Constitutional revisions are no longer possible," another Komeito member said.

"Now is not the time for constitutional revisions," a government source said.

The scandal has also drastically changed Abe's prospects for easily winning a third straight term as LDP president.

"The prime minister is no longer in a situation in which he can be reelected easily," a middle-ranking LDP member said.

Depending on developments, Abe may decide not to run in the leadership election, another LDP member said.

Abe apparently aims to put the scandal behind him by accepting an opposition demand to summon Sagawa to parliament for testimony over the issue.

But an LDP official said the scandal will not be over if Sagawa declines to take responsibility for the document alterations.

The LDP official also said that the entire cabinet may eventually be forced to resign if Finance Minister Taro Aso steps down over the scandal.

Six opposition parties are considering submitting a no-confidence motion against the Abe cabinet, sources familiar with their talks said. Jiji Press