Asia-Pacific

Almost half voters think Japan PM should quit

(Agencies)
Updated: 2011-02-21 09:50

TOKYO - Nearly half of Japanese voters believe Prime Minister Naoto Kan should quit soon, a poll by the Asahi newspaper showed on Monday as Kan struggles with a divided parliament and feuding inside his own party.

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Support for the Democratic Party-led government was only 20 percent, according to the poll, down from 26 percent in the newspaper's previous survey last month, weakening Kan's clout and hampering his efforts to carry out tax and social security reforms.

Voters are growing increasingly dissatisfied with Kan's handling of the economy, perceived missteps in diplomatic rows and a widening rift within the party over how to deal with powerbroker Ichiro Ozawa, who has been charged in a funding scandal.

Kan, faced with the difficulty of passing budget bills through a hung parliament, has refused to rule out a snap election, but analysts said he was more likely to stay in his job for now and pressure the opposition to do a deal.

The government has begun warning opposition parties not to risk hurting a nascent economic recovery or upsetting financial markets by failing to enact bills needed to implement a $1 trillion budget for the year from April 1.

"We're approaching the critical stage where we can bring the economy on to a path towards a fully fledged recovery through passage of the budget (for the fiscal year from April 1)," Kan told a parliamentary committee.

The Asahi poll showed almost half those surveyed believe Kan does not need to call an immediate general election, but in another survey by the Mainichi daily, 60 percent of respondents called for an early election.

The Mainichi poll showed support for the Kan government has fallen to 19 percent, down from 29 percent in its January survey.

Some analysts said Kan might cling to his post for now but could be forced to quit once nationwide local elections in April are over and opposition parties become more flexible about deal-making.

"For now, he will hang tough, neither resigning nor calling a snap election," said Minoru Morita, an independent political commentator.

"Once the local elections are over, the New Komeito in particular may be willing to compromise (by helping pass budget bills in exchange for Kan's resignation)," he said.

"The Democrats will lose massively in the local elections and Kan will not be able to hang on."

The New Komeito, Japan's second-largest opposition party, has rejected a deal proposed by a senior DPJ lawmaker in which Kan would quit in return for help in securing passage of a workable budget, the Asahi said on Friday.

In the Mainichi poll, 26 percent of those surveyed said they would vote for the main opposition Liberal Democratic Party if a lower house election were held now, more than the 21 percent who said they would vote for the ruling party.

Figures were 25 percent for the LDP and 19 percent for the DPJ in the Asahi poll.

Speculation that Kan would have to quit or call a snap general election intensified last week after 16 lawmakers critical of his push for tax reforms to curb Japan's public debt said they wanted to leave the party's lower house caucus.

The DPJ can win parliamentary approval for the 2011/12 budget because it controls the lower house.

To pass enabling bills, however, it must either win over enough opposition votes to gain a simple majority in the opposition-controlled upper house or secure a two-thirds lower house majority, with possible help from the tiny Social Democratic Party, in order to override the upper chamber.

But Tomoko Abe, policy chief of the former coalition partner of the DPJ, said on Sunday that the party would likely oppose a key budget-related bill that would enable the issuance of deficit-financing bonds.