By JOHN MURPHYApril 22, 2009
TOKYO -- Two months ago, Japan's embattled prime minister, Taro Aso, was so unpopular that members of his own ruling party were urging him to step down to avoid defeat in this year's election.
But new opinion polls show that Japan's leader, whose approval rating fell to the single digits in some polls, is mounting a surprising comeback.
Lifted by his new 15.4 trillion yen ($157 billion) economic stimulus package, his firm response to North Korea's rocket launch and, most important, an indictment plaguing the main opposition party, Mr. Aso is experiencing a bounce in the polls.
Support for Mr. Aso's cabinet has risen to 26%, from a low of 13% in February, a poll in the Asahi Shimbun showed Tuesday. The survey also showed that the cabinet's disapproval rating fell to 57% from 64%. A poll taken by Japanese national broadcaster NHK earlier this month said support for Mr. Aso's cabinet had reached 30%, up 12 percentage points from March.
This year's election, which must be held before October, is seen as one of Japan's most important in decades. The opposition Democratic Party of Japan, led by 66-year-old maverick Ichiro Ozawa, threatens to unseat 68-year-old Mr. Aso's Liberal Democratic Party, which has controlled Japanese politics almost continuously since its founding in 1955.
Such a victory would shake the foundations of the Japanese political system, sweeping away Japan's old guard and helping the world's second-largest economy make reforms that might allow it to climb out of its worst recession since World War II.
In February, Mr. Aso's support had fallen below 10% in some polls. At the time, the battered economy was continuing make many jobless, the prime minister was dogged by accusations of incompetence and his finance minister was forced to resign after appearing to be intoxicated at an important news conference. With such bad polling numbers, Mr. Aso had been hesitant to even consider an election.
But last month's indictment of Mr. Ozawa's top aide Takanori Okubo for illegal fundraising -- which Mr. Okubo denies -- has given Mr. Aso a chance to claw his way back in the polls. Support for the opposition party was sent tumbling as voters, once enchanted with Mr. Ozawa's promises of change, began to see his party as not that different from the LDP, analysts say. In the Asahi Shinbum poll, 61% of respondents said they wanted Mr. Ozawa to step down as party leader.
Now, some ruling party members are calling on Mr. Aso to cash in on his new political gains and call the election as early as next month.
"Everybody had been writing off the LDP, but now it has really rebounded," says Jeff Kingston, director of Asian Studies at Temple University's Japan campus.
To be sure, Mr. Aso's recent rise in the polls is no guarantee of victory. Tuesday's Asahi Shimbun poll showed that 41% of voters would prefer a government controlled by the opposition party, even after the allegations of scandal, compared with 29% for the LDP.
Analysts also caution that Mr. Aso's gains are largely due to the opposition party's failures rather than from any significant improvement in his party's policies or behavior. Mr. Aso's government remains hobbled by a painful recession, rising unemployment and widespread disapproval of its leadership.
Most worrying for Japan, analysts say, is that if Mr. Aso's ruling party ekes out another victory in the election for the lower house of parliament, it will only prolong the gridlock that has disabled Japanese politics because the upper house will remain controlled by the opposition party.
Mr. Aso has given no indication when the vote might be. Analysts say that while an early date would let him capitalize on his current rise in the polls, he might prefer to wait to allow voters to begin to feel the impact of the government's stimulus packages.
Either way, analysts say, Mr. Aso is suddenly back in the driver's seat. Jesper Koll, president and CEO of Tantallon Research Japan, says voters were impressed by the prime minister's efforts to reach out to the public in shaping his latest stimulus package, inviting academics, business leaders, civil society groups and other experts in drawing up the proposal.
"They really reached out of their ivory tower of technocrats and that has brought the LDP a lot of goodwill," he said.
Mr. Aso's tough talk against North Korea after its rocket launch this month also scored with voters. Even the economic crisis may help Mr. Aso among voters who are reluctant to support the opposition during a period of uncertainty.
"If you combine Ozawa's stumble with the economic crisis and the Korean crisis, that certainly helps the LDP's prospects greatly," Mr. Kingston said.
—Miho Inada contributed to this article.
Write to John Murphy at john.murphy@wsj.com
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