The Week In Japan: Takaichi Gets Her Supplemental Budget

As such, although Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama said Friday that the government will not rely on deficit bonds to fund the tax cut, it would be premature to take this claim at face value. The Takaichi government, after all, will have to account not only for the JPY 4.4 trillion or so that it could lose by reducing the consumption tax on foodstuffs to 1% but also for the various measures it introduces to compensate business interests as well as a possible rebate to households to make the tax cut equivalent to reducing it to zero.

In the Diet deliberations on Friday, Takaichi continued to face questions over her staff's involvement in the creation and dissemination of defamatory videos aimed at her rivals for the LDP's leadership last year.

One day after she said that she lacked a subscription and therefore could not listen to a recording purportedly between one of her secretaries and a man who says he made videos – she said that she listened to it Thursday evening and could not discern whether it was her secretary's voice.

She said that there was no record in her office of the meeting and took offense that a weekly tabloid article is being given more credence than her denials about having any connection to these activities. She claimed that there was something odd about the recording, implying that it was fake or manipulated. When a Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) lawmaker suggested that she file a complaint with the publication, she replied that she was too busy with affairs of state and could not spare the time.

Despite Takaichi's indignation, this story does not seem to be going away. Asahi notes, for example, that her responses to questioning have subtly shifted, from the prime minister and her secretary“having no acquaintance” with the man alleged to have made the videos to“not having met” the man.

On Friday, Centrist Reform Alliance (CRA) leader Junya Ogawa said that if the prime minister does not provide clear answers, her secretary should be called for questioning in the Diet. Her response to questioning has also drawn some criticism from within the LDP, albeit anonymously for now.

Asahi has a timeline of the allegations and the prime minister's response here.

For the second time this week, Prime Minister Takaichi used her participation in parliamentary deliberations to remark upon the value of the yen. In the upper house budget committee on Friday, the prime minister repeated her oft-stated view that yen weakness“has merits and demerits,” and argued that strengthening Japan's international competitiveness will“ensure confidence in the yen.” She also stressed that her focus is on boosting investment and potential growth.

The Mainichi Shimbun, analyzing its recent opinion poll, notes that Takaichi's approval among independents (35%) fell below their disapproval (37%) for the first time, with dissatisfaction with the government's handling of inflation as a possible cause of the shift. Inflation may also be a factor in the government's falling support among the young; Mainichi found that Takaichi's approval from voters under 30 fell below 50% for the first time.

Takaichi hosted LDP upper house officials at the Kantei (official residence) again on Friday evening to express her gratitude for their help in moving the supplemental budget through the Diet.

The Japanese government has begun talks with the Indonesian government regarding the sale of retired Asagiri-class destroyers.

The Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry announced an additional JPY 150 billion investment in chipmaker Rapidus, bringing the government's total investment to at least JPY 2.6 trillion.