Koizumi faces test in vote as ratings slide

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TOKYO -- Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, who once enjoyed an unprecedented degree of public support, faces a serious challenge Sunday in the House of Councilors election.

According to a survey last week by the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's largest mass-circulation daily, support for the Koizumi Cabinet was at a record low of 35.7 percent, while 39.1 percent of those polled disapproved of the Cabinet. Other polls also indicated that approval ratings for Mr. Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) had slipped.

"We don't rely much on opinion polls, though we certainly have a sense of crisis," said one LDP leader who asked not to be named.

The politician recalled the bitter experience of the 1998 House of Councilors election. Major polls had showed that the LDP would win more seats than it had held going into the election, but it ended up suffering a stunning defeat, which drove Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto from office.

Analysts attributed the LDP's slump to mounting public dissatisfaction with the participation of Japan's Self-Defense Forces (SDF) in the U.S.-led invasion and occupation of Iraq, and the pension-reform bills that the ruling coalition (the LDP and New Komeito, backed by Soka Gakkai, Japan's largest lay Buddhist organization) forced through the Diet.

More than 100 lawmakers, including Cabinet ministers and opposition party members, had not paid their premiums for the compulsory national pension system. The opposition volunteered to disclose the payment records of members, but the LDP refused to do so, citing "privacy" concerns.

The nonpayment scandal and the shaky condition of the pension system itself "seemed to make more voters -- especially in the countryside, including LDP strongholds -- disenchanted with the ruling party," said Akikazu Hashimoto, a professor of political science at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies.

Mr. Hashimoto added that the public disenchantment coincides with grinding recession in the countryside, where local economies have been hit hard by business restructuring.

"Those who have no hope for a pay raise began to worry that they would not get their pensions either as long as the LDP is in power," he said.

"It should be no surprise that our party has been criticized for pension issues," the unnamed LDP leader said. "But we're making efforts to have the public understand our ideas and policies."