TOKYO - Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi marked one year in office on Wednesday, facing tough parliamentary deliberations ahead on key policy items and mounting diplomatic and security challenges while public support for her Cabinet shows signs of weakening.
The anniversary comes amid the lingering fallout from the effective ouster of a scandal-hit minister, potentially eroding public trust in politics and Takaichi's Liberal Democratic Party in the crucial months leading up to unified local elections next spring.
One of the top priorities for her administration is to enact legislation to cut the consumption tax on food and beverages from 8 percent to 1 percent for two years from next April as a countermeasure against inflation, during the current extraordinary parliamentary session
Attention is also focused on the fate of a bill to reduce the number of seats in the House of Representatives, a key pledge in a coalition agreement between the LDP and its junior partner, the Japan Innovation Party.
Backed by relatively high Cabinet approval ratings, the LDP-JIP bloc scored a crushing victory in the lower house election in February, securing well over the two-thirds majority in the chamber required to override the Senate when pushing through bills.
The ruling camp, however, remains a minority in the less powerful upper house, making cooperation with opposition parties essential if it wants to ensure the smooth enactment of legislation.
The opposition parties, still fragmented, have stepped up their attacks since controversial remarks by former farm minister Kazuo Yana came to light late last month, questioning his fitness to serve as a lawmaker and seeking to hold Takaichi accountable for appointing him to the Cabinet.
Yana, known as Takaichi's trusted advisor for agricultural policy, resigned amid growing pressure over his remarks suggesting road budget cuts for municipalities in his constituency whose leaders backed his rival in the February general election.
Yana took up the post of farm minister in a Cabinet reshuffle in September. He is one of the LDP lawmakers disciplined by the party over a high-profile political slush fund scandal revealed in 2023.
In the wake of the controversy surrounding Yana, the approval rating for Takaichi's Cabinet fell to a record low of 49.1 percent in a Kyodo News poll conducted Saturday and Sunday.
The past year has seen Takaichi facing criticism for her perceived high-handed political approach that appeared to follow the sweeping general election win.
Takaichi won the LDP leadership race to succeed Shigeru Ishiba in early October of 2025, about a week before the Komeito party left its coalition with the LDP, ending their 26-year partnership.
A day after the LDP signed a coalition deal with the JIP, she became Japan's first female prime minister on Oct. 21.
At this year's main Diet session, held from mid-February to late July, Takaichi's government advanced several conservative initiatives, such as a revised Imperial House Law that effectively sidestepped debate on introducing female emperors.
The enacted bills included those to penalize desecration of Japan's national flag, which critics warned could infringe on freedom of expression, and to establish the National Intelligence Council for the country's security.
The legislation for a "second capital" system, as a backup for Tokyo, was also passed by parliament. The vision effectively aligns with the "Osaka metropolis plan," a pet project of the JIP based in the western Japan prefecture of Osaka, to streamline local administrative functions.
Meanwhile, delays in Diet deliberations due to Takaichi's decision to dissolve the lower house in January for the snap election the following month prevented the enactment of the fiscal 2026 initial budget in time for the start of the new year in April.
On the diplomatic front, Takaichi met with U.S. President Donald Trump multiple times, agreeing to boost the bilateral alliance, while facing a difficult balancing act in responding to Washington's sanctions against the International Criminal Court led by Japanese national Tomoko Akane.
Ties with China have remained strained since Beijing was angered by remarks by Takaichi last November that an attack on Taiwan, a self-ruled island claimed by China, could prompt Japan's Self-Defense Forces to act in support of the United States.
