JAPAN TIMES


 

 
Regional revitalization minister Satsuki Katayama is the Cabinet member most widely seen by Japanese people as unfit to be a minister, a Jiji Press survey showed.

Katayama was chosen by 43.7 percent of respondents, who were asked which members of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Cabinet are unsuited for their roles, with multiple answers allowed.

Since taking office in Abe’s Cabinet reshuffle in October, Katayama has repeatedly corrected her political funding reports.

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Taro Aso landed in second place, at 30.1 percent. He was grilled by opposition lawmakers in the Diet over his ministry’s tampering of documents.

Yoshitaka Sakurada, minister in charge of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games, came third at 29.4 percent. Sakurada, who doubles as minister for cybersecurity, attracted foreign media attention for saying that he did not use a computer.

Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita, who oversees the amended immigration control law to accept more foreign workers, placed fourth at 6.8 percent.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga came in fifth place (6.1 percent), followed by Mitsuhiro Miyakoshi, minister for Okinawa and Northern Territories affairs (3.6 percent) and land minister Keiichi Ishii (3.5 percent), who tied with economic and fiscal policy minister Toshimitsu Motegi.

The interview-based survey, conducted between Dec. 7 and Monday, covered 2,000 people aged 18 or over across Japan. It received valid answers from 60.7 percent of those polled.