Public support for Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has risen sharply since he dissolved parliament and called nationwide elections after a key postal reform bill was rejected, newspaper polls showed yesterday.
Koizumi's approval rate rose to 46 percent, up 9 points from an all-time low of 37 percent the previous month, the Mainichi newspaper said. An Asahi newspaper survey also showed a boost in support.
The upper house of parliament on Monday rejected Koizumi's decade-long plan to privatize Japan Post's enormous postal savings account system.
The defeat came with the help of defectors from his own ruling Liberal Democratic Party.
More than half of those polled backed Koizumi's decision to retaliate by dissolving parliament's lower house and to hold Sept. 11 elections for the chamber's 480 seats, according to polls by both the Mainichi and the Yomiuri, another national daily.
The government was encouraged by the poll results.
"I think it shows that the public has a deep understanding of the circumstances that the Cabinet faces, and the government's enthusiasm for future reforms," said Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda.
Koizumi has said that those LDP members who opposed his reforms would not be endorsed by the party in the upcoming elections.
His decision effectively splits the LDP into two camps and could allow the Democratic Party, Japan's biggest opposition group, to improve its standing and possibly form a ruling coalition. Such an upset would mark only the second time since the LDP's founding in 1955 for a non-LDP bloc to control Japan's government.
But the Mainichi and Asahi polls indicated yesterday that more people continued to back an LDP-dominated government over having the opposition Democrats take power.
The Mainichi said 50 percent wanted to see the LDP retain its hold on government compared to 35 percent supporting the opposition DPJ.
All three national dailies conducted their surveys by telephone in the two days immediately after Koizumi dissolved the lower house.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday vowed that those behind bogus flood control projects would be arrested before Christmas, days after deadly back-to-back typhoons left swathes of the country underwater. Scores of construction firm owners, government officials and lawmakers — including Marcos’ cousin congressman — have been accused of pocketing funds for substandard or so-called “ghost” infrastructure projects. The Philippine Department of Finance has estimated the nation’s economy lost up to 118.5 billion pesos (US$2 billion) since 2023 due to corruption in flood control projects. Criminal cases against most of the people implicated are nearly complete, Marcos told reporters. “We don’t file cases for
Ecuadorans are today to vote on whether to allow the return of foreign military bases and the drafting of a new constitution that could give the country’s president more power. Voters are to decide on the presence of foreign military bases, which have been banned on Ecuadoran soil since 2008. A “yes” vote would likely bring the return of the US military to the Manta air base on the Pacific coast — once a hub for US anti-drug operations. Other questions concern ending public funding for political parties, reducing the number of lawmakers and creating an elected body that would
A feud has broken out between the top leaders of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on whether to maintain close ties with Russia. The AfD leader Alice Weidel this week slammed planned visits to Russia by some party lawmakers, while coleader Tino Chrupalla voiced a defense of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The unusual split comes at a time when mainstream politicians have accused the anti-immigration AfD of acting as stooges for the Kremlin and even spying for Russia. The row has also erupted in a year in which the AfD is flying high, often polling above the record 20 percent it
‘ATTACK ON CIVILIZATION’: The culture ministry released drawings of six missing statues representing the Roman goddess of Venus, the tallest of which was 40cm Investigators believe that the theft of several ancient statues dating back to the Roman era from Syria’s national museum was likely the work of an individual, not an organized gang, officials said on Wednesday. The National Museum of Damascus was closed after the heist was discovered early on Monday. The museum had reopened in January as the country recovers from a 14-year civil war and the fall of the 54-year al-Assad dynasty last year. On Wednesday, a security vehicle was parked outside the main gate of the museum in central Damascus while security guards stood nearby. People were not allowed in because
RSS