The approval rating for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Cabinet was down 4.3 points in a Kyodo News poll conducted after the government decided Tuesday to allow Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defense.
In the telephone poll conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday, the approval rating stood at 47.8 percent, down from 52.1 percent in the June 21-22 survey and slipping below 50 percent for the first time since December.
The disapproval rating stood at 40.6 percent, topping 40 percent for the first time since the second Abe administration came to power in December 2012.
In the survey, 54.4 percent of respondents opposed the Cabinet’s decision to change Japan’s long-standing interpretation of the pacifist Constitution to allow the country to exercise the right to collective self-defense, while 34.6 percent expressed support.
With the decision coming only a month and a half after the prime minister instructed the government and the ruling parties to consider the change, 82.1 percent of the respondents said there had not been sufficient discussion on the issue.
Of the 1,010 respondents, 73.9 percent expressed concern that the scope for Japan to exercise the right of collective self-defense could expand in the future, while 68.4 percent said Abe should call a general election to allow voters to give their verdict.
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