The approval rating for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Cabinet continues to decline, falling to 42 percent in a nationwide opinion poll conducted by The Yomiuri Shimbun on Saturday and Sunday.
Marking its second consecutive drop, the approval rating fell by six percentage points from 48 percent in the previous poll conducted on March 9-11.
The disapproval rating rose to 50 percent from 42 percent in the previous poll, exceeding the approval rating for the first time since a survey conducted on Oct. 7-8 last year, just before the start of official campaigning for the House of Representatives election in that month.
The latest opinion poll was conducted following the passage of the fiscal 2018 budget and the summoning of Nobuhisa Sagawa, former chief of the National Tax Agency, who testified as a sworn witness before the Diet concerning the manipulation of Finance Ministry-approved documents related to a controversial sale of state-owned land to private school operator Moritomo Gakuen.
The Cabinet approval rating was down 12 percentage points from 54 percent in a survey on Feb. 10-11, conducted before the scandal came to light. The figure is still higher than the 36 percent recorded in a survey in July last year, which was the lowest since the launch of Abe's second Cabinet in December 2012.
As to why they did not support the Cabinet, 54 percent said they do not trust the prime minister. That percentage is the highest since the launch of Abe's second Cabinet, tying the percentage who gave that answer in a survey conducted in August last year.
Sagawa, who was director general of the ministry's Financial Bureau when bureau officials manipulated the documents, did not explain the background of the alterations when he testified at the Diet. He said there was no instruction from Abe or others.
Seventy-five percent of respondents said they are not convinced by Sagawa's explanation. Among respondents with no political party affiliation, 86 percent said the same, and more than half, or 56 percent, of those supporting the ruling Liberal Democratic Party said they are not satisfied.
Fifty-one percent said Finance Minister Taro Aso should resign over the scandal, while 40 percent said he does not need to do so. When it comes to issues involving Moritomo Gakuen, 64 percent said Abe is greatly responsible, and 60 percent said Abe's wife, Akie, should be summoned to the Diet to provide testimony.
The survey was conducted by polling 921 households with landline phones and 1,160 mobile phone users -- all eligible voters aged 18 or older -- sampled with a random digit dialing method. Of them, 1,111 people -- 540 on landlines and 571 on mobile phones, gave valid answers.
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