TOKYO, Sept. 12, 2020—The Japanese media, which so ruthlessly attacked PM Shinzo Abe’s policies, from population growth to the corona virus face masks, earlier this month flip-flopped in support of the outgoing prime minister reporting that their opinion polls showed a sharp rebound of popular support, so high that the data suggested voters want Abe to come back quick as Japanese leader.
The polls that key Japanese newspapers and television stations took this week (all of them from Sept. 2 to 6) showed jumps of as much as 26 to 27 percentage points compared with August when the data were at rockbottom lows.
Even the supposed-to-be anti-establishment Asahi newspaper’s polls put Abe’s popular support (support strongly and support to certain degree combined) as high as 71%. The national TV network JNN’s similar poll was 62.4 percent, up 27.0 pints. Respondents cited Abe’s economic, diplomatic, social welfare polities for reasons of positive support. In August, they gave bad marks on the three Abe policies.
Even before the latest polls, the media’s data collection methods looked questionable, influenced greatly by anecdotal comments of television personalities, so-called critics, commentators and economists. What seemed to have driven the media to give Abe strong support rebounds was that two of his successor candidates coming from rival ‘factions’ of his ruling Liberal Democratic Party – former defense secretary Shigeru Ishiba and former foreign minister Fumio Kishida – both failed to collect enough preliminary in-party votes, so the media gave the polls rebound to Abe in support of Abe’s appointee and current chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga, in virtually snugging up to the soon-to-be-formed Suga cabinet, so that the media can remain part of the establishment.
Another takeaway from the polls is that the Japanese public has become far more conservative and pro-power and pro-bureaucracy than ever before. Like the LDP members who support Suga, but not Ishiba or Kishida, they don’t want change and feel cozy with what Abe has been doing, which Suga at the Sept. 12 news conference, promised to do.
Not only they are loath to and fearful of change but they also have licked the sweet taste of ‘nostalgia’ by backpedaling to what Abe did for them, giving them two so tiny face masks for each household that no adults can wear, a stingy $900 corona virus relief check per person. The public worries that Ishiba or Kishida may not give them such sweeteners, however small they may be.
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