Political Pulse

Circumstances Favor Ishiba’s Political Survival For Now; Opposition Parties, LDP Rivals Await their Chance

The Yomiuri Shimbun
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba speaks at the Budget Committee of the House of Representatives on Jan. 31.

By Satoshi Ogawa

8:00 JST, February 8, 2025

When the ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito lost its majority in last October’s general election, many LDP politicians predicted that Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s administration couldn’t last long because it wouldn’t be able to pass a budget proposal in the extraordinary Diet session later that year or in the ordinary Diet session that started last month.

However, more and more politicians now tend to think Ishiba could survive at least until the House of Councillors election coming in July. Why has their assessment changed so drastically? And will he actually survive the ordinary Diet session?

Let’s examine some reasons behind the shifting attitudes within the LDP.

First, Ishiba’s approval rating has been unexpectedly stable. In The Yomiuri Shimbun’s latest poll, conducted in mid-January, it was 40%. In the LDP, it is believed if the sum of the incumbent prime minister’s approval rating and the main ruling party’s approval rating falls below 50%, that administration will end soon. Conversely, as the sum total of Ishiba’s and the LDP’s approval ratings is a little less than 70%, they believe he could survive.

Second, they have started to anticipate that the administration could actually manage to pass the fiscal 2025 budget proposal by getting cooperation from opposition parties. In the last ordinary Diet session, the ruling parties negotiated with the Democratic Party for the People, the Japan Innovation Party and the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan on revising the budget to fulfill the top priority pledge of each of those parties. By taking this strategy, the LDP could hedge its bets and strengthen its negotiation power. In fact, it worked. Not only the DPFP but also the JIP voted for the supplementary budget proposal. Even the CDPJ agreed to allow the ruling parties to proceed to a vote.

Third, LDP insiders have tended to judge the opposition parties as not strong enough to overthrow the Ishiba administration, even if they were to attempt it. In the extraordinary Diet session, the opposition parties seemed unwilling to submit a no-confidence motion against the prime minister. And in the ordinary Diet session so far, the opposition parties seem to continue to hold the same stance. Now that the opposition parties have gained majority power, voters expect them to produce fruits through mature discussion in the Diet. Therefore, they have felt pressure to pass the budget proposal if the ruling parties show a willingness to compromise over some of their demands on revising it.

In addition, the ruling parties guess that the opposition parties want to approach the upper house election this summer with Ishiba still in place, rather than take their chances running against a new prime minister, as he displayed a lack of campaigning ability in last year’s general election. If so, the opposition parties will refrain from submitting a no-confidence motion against Ishiba based on their own political calculations.

In every upper house election, half of the seats are contested. This time, the ruling party would need to win 50 of the contested seats to maintain its majority, but 66 of those seats are now held by ruling party incumbents. The hurdle they face is thus relatively low, so not only Ishiba but also many LDP members in the House of Councillors don’t have a severe sense of crisis.

Fourth and finally, because of all the analyses above, rival LDP politicians have refrained from speaking up to ask him to resign.

Having said that, we cannot ignore some worst-case scenarios in which the Ishiba administration could end during the ordinary Diet session.

One such scenario might be caused by a decline in his approval rating. Cabinet members’ scandals or a diplomatic disaster could be the trigger for that.

The opposition parties will surely become more aggressive later in this ordinary Diet session on some policy agendas, such as the LDP political money scandal that caused the LDP’s losses in the last general election or legislation to allow married couples to choose separate surnames, which may divide the LDP and anger right-wing LDP supporters if the Ishiba administration mishandles the matter.

If his approval rating drops below 30%, opposition parties will rethink their hesitance to vote against the budget proposal and may seek to submit a no-confidence motion. Also, LDP members in the House of Councillors may worry enough about losing their seats to ask Ishiba’s intraparty rivals to rise against him for their benefit. Even Komeito might pressure the LDP to replace him. Some may remember the 2001 political situation in which then Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori was forced to resign in the spring amid a low approval rating.

With regard to LDP rivals, former economic security minister Sanae Takaichi, who was beaten by Ishiba in the final vote in the LDP presidential election last fall, has been active especially on blocking a proposal by opposition parties to revise the law on surnames for married couples. Instead, she is ready to propose an alternative law to expand opportunities for married people to use their original names legally while maintaining the current requirement for married couples to have the same surname in their family register.

Before he took office, Ishiba supported revising the law to introduce a selective separate surname system for married couples. Since taking office, however, he has stressed his intention to take legislative measures, but seemed to remain indifferent, leaving it to the LDP to decide the policy.

This matter will surely become a hot issue latter this ordinary Diet session as the CDPJ has contrived to make it so. If Takaichi pulls the LDP together behind her proposal, she will hold the spotlight again — and voices urging her to take Ishiba’s place will grow within the LDP’s conservative wing.

Former Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi has also been active on defending political donations from corporations and organizations. Although he ruined his reputation for policy debate in the last LDP presidential election, he has gradually restored it by showing his ability to strike back when opposition parties criticized the LDP’s stance on the donations issue. A Yomiuri Shimbun poll in December showed that 60% of respondents agreed with the LDP’s stance that political donations from corporations and organizations should be kept but be made more transparent, while only 30% said they should be abolished.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi also seems to have a keen eye to replace Ishiba and wants to show he is ready to go. Former economic security minister Takayuki Kobayashi and former secretary general Toshimitsu Motegi held study meetings late January that were taken as signs of their intention to drive for the LDP presidency.

In short, despite the seeming stability of the atmosphere now surrounding Ishiba, the old proverb still applies: “An inch ahead is darkness.”

Political Pulse appears every Saturday.