A whole new ballgame

Kishida's exit gives hope to the LDP

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Koizumi Shinjirō supports his alma mater Kantō Gakuin Mutsuura in an early-round Summer Koshien game in August 2018. Source: shinjiro.info

There has not been much opinion polling since Prime Minister Kishida Fumio announced that he would not seek reelection as leader of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), but a new Nikkei Shimbun poll suggests that Kishida’s exit has fundamentally reshaped the LDP’s prospects even before the leadership field has taken shape.

In a flash poll conducted 21-22 August, Nikkei found that when asked which party they will vote for in the next general election, the LDP was favored by 39 percent of respondents, a nine-point increase compared with July. At the same time, the Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) fell two points to 11 percent. The results were similar in overall party approval. The LDP gained four points to 36 percent, the CDP fell two, and, perhaps more importantly, the share of LDP supporters surpassed the share of independents (34 percent).

It is possible that this bump is a bit of a halo effect from Kishida’s exit, which 78 percent of respondents said was the appropriate decision. After all, only 29 percent said that they think that the change in LDP leadership will restore public trust in the party. Still, the impending replacement of Kishida has opened up the possibility that the party, after picking a new leader, can a snap election and still retain a healthy majority, a prospect that seemed remote if Kishida stayed in the race.

Whether the LDP is able to achieve this outcome will depend on how its leadership election unfolds. Here, the Nikkei poll has some striking findings about the public’s — and LDP supporters’ preferences.