The approval rating for Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's administration had consistently stayed below 30 percent for seven months starting from October and hit a low of 21 percent in February, with a slight improvement to 26 percent now. This rise in approval ratings came after the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan punished 39 lawmakers on April 9 over a political fund scandal that had severely impacted the party and the Cabinet.
Even though the approval rating for Kishida's administration saw a slight increase, a majority of respondents, 78 percent, expressed disapproval of Kishida's handling of the political fund scandal. Additionally, 67 percent of the participants were dissatisfied with the LDP's punishment meted out to the lawmakers involved in the scandal. Despite the dissatisfaction, the survey showed that the approval rating for the LDP went up to 26 percent from 22 percent in March, indicating a slight positive trend for the ruling party. The survey, conducted through telephone calls, also revealed that an overwhelming 92 percent of respondents believed that the truth about the scandal had not been completely disclosed.