Kishida's Approval Rating Jumps 5%P in a Month
Poor Performance in 20% Range for 4 Months
Analysis of Ukraine Visit and Korea-Japan Summit Effects
After several months of a sluggish trend, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's approval rating has recently started to rise. The Kishida Cabinet succeeded in boosting its approval rating, which had remained around 20-30%, thanks to various diplomatic achievements such as the Japan-South Korea summit and a visit to Ukraine.
The Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported that a public opinion poll conducted over three days starting from the 24th, with 928 respondents, showed the Kishida Cabinet's approval rating rising 5 percentage points from the previous month to 48%.
According to polls conducted by Asahi Shimbun and Sankei Shimbun over two days starting from the 18th, 40% and 45.9% of respondents respectively expressed support for the Cabinet. These figures represent increases of 5 percentage points and 5.3 percentage points compared to the previous month. Yomiuri Shimbun and NHK recorded approval ratings of 42% and 41.4% for the Kishida Cabinet, reflecting increases of 1 percentage point and 5.7 percentage points respectively from the previous month.
The positive response appears to be linked to the Japan-South Korea summit and the surprise visit to Ukraine. Until recently, the Kishida Cabinet's approval rating had remained in the 20% range for four consecutive months since October last year, due to overlapping negative factors such as suspicions of collusion between the Liberal Democratic Party and the Unification Church (Family Federation for World Peace and Unification) and the state funeral issue of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
In response, Japanese media referred to the so-called "Aoki's Law," which suggests that it is difficult to maintain power if the combined approval ratings of the Cabinet and the Liberal Democratic Party fall below 50%, analyzing that the Kishida Cabinet was in crisis.
However, recently, as the South Korean government proposed a solution to the issue of compensation for forced labor during Japanese colonial rule, the two countries began to improve their relationship, leading public opinion to adopt a more favorable view. According to the Nihon Keizai poll, 63% of respondents positively evaluated the government's achievements in the Japan-South Korea summit, three times the 21% who opposed it.
In the case of Asahi Shimbun, 55% of respondents gave a positive evaluation of the Japan-South Korea summit. Regarding the "third-party compensation plan," which involves compensation to victims through a foundation under the South Korean government, 78% of Cabinet supporters and 56% of those who do not support the Cabinet viewed it favorably.
Prime Minister Kishida's visit to Ukraine is also analyzed to have had a significant impact on the rise in approval ratings. On the 21st, Kishida met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Ukraine, working to further solidify the anti-Russian coalition centered on Western countries. In particular, inviting President Zelensky to the upcoming G7 summit, chaired by Japan, was seen as a demonstration of Japan's diplomatic influence. In the Nihon Keizai poll, 71% of respondents reacted positively to Kishida's visit to Ukraine.
However, Japanese public opinion still sees the forced labor issue as not fully resolved. In the Nihon Keizai survey, only 21% of respondents believed that the forced labor issue would be resolved through South Korea's third-party compensation plan. More than half of respondents, 56%, answered that Japan-South Korea relations would not change in the future.
The Nihon Keizai explained, "In Japan, there is a prospect that with a change of government in South Korea, the issue of forced labor might arise again."
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