Is Taro Kono still popular? Posters show the dangerous reality of the Kishida administration
Amidst whispers of a significant loss of seats in the House of Representatives, the...
The “Liberal Democratic Party presidential election” is now treated as if it were an event of the past. The daily news reports and the frenzy that ensued…what was that all about? Taro Kono, who was thought to be the most likely candidate to win the election, was “unexpectedly” defeated. He was completely crushed. Now he has been relegated to the post of LDP Public Relations Committee Chairman, a post where he can eat cold rice.
However, Taro Kono is said to be very popular, as he has been inundated with inquiries from the offices of young members of his party asking him to support them in the election.
Kono was originally expected by the party to be the “face of the general election,” so it was only natural that he should be chosen as president. The LDP’s personnel and logic are difficult for the average person to understand.
Taro Kono’s speech on the street was amazing.
Former Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi used to be the most popular person in Japan, but now Taro Kono, the chairman of the LDP’s Public Relations Committee, is being sought after all over the country.
On October 9, Taro Kono was in front of Nishinomiya Station in Hyogo Prefecture. As soon as he arrived, he ran up on top of his campaign car, grabbed a microphone and shouted at the top of his lungs.
He said, “We cannot have ‘zero corona’ as the opposition parties claim. Please leave it to the Liberal Democratic Party and the Democratic Party of Japan to steer Japan forward after Corona!
In a voice that sounded a bit nasal and indulgent, he made this appeal at the start of his speech, which was met with loud applause.
More than 500 listeners stopped to listen to the speech of Taro Kono, the Public Relations Committee chairman, who came to support the incumbent of the LDP in Hyogo Ward 7. As the voltage of his speech rose, the number of spectators surrounding him increased.
Why couldn’t he win the presidential election with such centripetal force?…such a tremendous sense of elation filled the air in front of the station that day.
Unpopular current prime minister with two consecutive posters
Without waiting for the dissolution of the House of Representatives on March 14, each constituency is already in election mode. The campaign posters have been replaced by former Prime Minister Kan and Prime Minister Kishida in a super express, but Taro Kono and Shinjiro Koizumi are by far the most popular “partners” on the double posters. It seems that the “double poster” with Kishida is not very popular.
“The LDP has switched its name to the Kishida administration, but this has not stopped voters from turning away from the LDP. In the primary election 20 20 ~ 30 20-30 We have to be prepared to lose 20 to 30 seats in the primary elections.
That’s what an LDP election campaign official told me while looking at the latest survey figures. This is an extremely grim analysis, as a loss of seats in the constituencies will directly affect the proportional vote, and the LDP as a whole could lose 40 to 50 seats. A senior LDP lawmaker said.
“Prime Minister Kishida is now minimizing debate in the Diet and responding to criticism and points of view with a certain level of intensity and without changing his expression. In other words, he is adopting a tasteless and odorless strategy that stifles his personality to the utmost limit. This way, there are no flaws in the administration and no discrepancies arise.
For better or worse, there was no way to evaluate the situation in the first place, which is why the government’s approval rating immediately after its inauguration was much lower than when the Kan administration was formed. As a result, the popularity of the “individualist” Taro Kono, which had been thought to be over, has resurfaced.
The Kishida administration has been running on a breathlessly tight political schedule in order to avoid any rupture. On October 31, when the vote is cast, the people of Japan will decide whether things will go as planned.
Reporting and writing by: Takashi Hashimoto