Kyodo Poll: Hatoyama Cabinet Support down 10.2% since September

Written By: guyjin on November 3, 2009 No Comment

Kyodo news carried out a telephone poll of 1,025 registered voters over the weekend, and found that support for the Hatoyama Cabinet had fallen 10.2% since a similar poll a few weeks after the election. In spite of the fall, support is still relatively high, at 61.8%.

On a party basis, 43.2% of respondents supported the DPJ, while the LDP captured just 21.2%. So the governing party has little to worry about at the present time in terms of competition from the former ruling party. As for public support for the current ruling coalition however, this was relatively lukewarm at best, with 69.8% of respondents saying that they don’t think the coalition is functioning well. When asked what kind of administration they would prefer after the House of Councillors election next year, 38.8% want a government of the DPJ alone, 24.5% want the current coalition maintained, and 22% would like to see another type of coalition, led by the DPJ. Its not hard to understand why the current coalition is so unpopular, given that coalition members the SDP and PNP received just 1.9% and 0.5% support respectively in the poll.

In terms of policy issues, 68% of respondents were open to the DPJ revising some of its manifesto pledges in the interest of keeping spending down, to avoid the need to issue more government bonds. 75.1% were also opposed in principle to the issue of further bonds, suggesting a widespread desire among voters to get more of a handle on the rising national debt.

Asked about the recent selection of Saito Jiro, a former Vice Finance Minister, to lead Japan Post, 49.4% opposed the appointment, and only 27% supported it. 61.1% also believed that the appointment contradicted the DPJ pledge to remove “amakudari” from politics.

In a more personal matter, only 22.2% said that Hatoyama’s explanations concerning his political funds scandal had been convincing, suggesting not only a need for the Prime Minister to do more on the issue, but a potential weapon for the LDP to use against him. On the question of leadership, 74.4% said that the Prime Minister needs to exert more of his own leadership, a view that I have spoken about here a few weeks ago (see Kamei Economics: Where is Hatoyama).