{"id":45544,"date":"2025-03-17T05:06:33","date_gmt":"2025-03-17T05:06:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=45544"},"modified":"2025-03-17T05:06:37","modified_gmt":"2025-03-17T05:06:37","slug":"japan-pm-ishibas-cabinet-approval-hits-record-low-asahi-reports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=45544","title":{"rendered":"Japan PM Ishiba’s cabinet approval hits record low, Asahi reports"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

(Reuters) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

TOKYO, March 17 – Public support for Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s government dropped to a record low after he handed out gift vouchers to some ruling party lawmakers, a poll conducted by the Asahi newspaper showed on Monday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The approval rating slid 14 percentage points to 26% from the previous survey done in February, the worst since Ishiba took the office last October, according to the March 15-16 poll by the Asahi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other polls done by the Yomiuri newspaper and the Mainichi newspaper over the weekend also showed public approval for the Ishiba’s cabinet fell to a record low.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ishiba found himself in a hot water as he handed out gift vouchers<\/a> worth 100,000 yen ($673) each to 15 first-term lower house lawmakers of his ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) earlier this month, drawing criticism as it could violate a political law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking in parliament, Ishiba said he used “pocket money” to hand out gift certificates to the lawmakers before having dinner with them on March 3 as a “show of appreciation” for their hard work getting elected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The premier said the gift handout didn’t violate a political fund law but apologised for his action caused “distrust and anger among many people.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All of the 15 lawmakers returned the gift vouchers to the Ishiba’s office, according to Japanese media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The slide in opinion polls could be a blow to Ishiba’s leadership ahead of an upper house election slated for July, and comes at a time when Japan’s economy faces headwinds from the escalating trade war waged by U.S. President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Reuters) TOKYO, March 17 – Public support for Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s government dropped to a record low after he handed out gift vouchers to some ruling party lawmakers, a poll conducted by the Asahi newspaper showed on Monday. The approval rating slid 14 percentage points to 26% from the previous survey done in February, the worst since Ishiba took the office last October, according to the March 15-16 poll by the Asahi. Other polls done by the Yomiuri newspaper and the Mainichi newspaper over the weekend also showed public approval for the Ishiba’s cabinet fell to a record… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":45545,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45544"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45544\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45546,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45544\/revisions\/45546"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/45545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}