Photo/Illutration Voters keep safe distance from each other in Tokyo’s Ginza district on June 28 when they listened to a campaign speech by a candidate running for governor. (Kazuhiro Nagashima)

Incumbent Yuriko Koike has maintained a comfortable lead for the July 5 Tokyo gubernatorial election as her rivals struggle to broaden support among voters, according to an Asahi Shimbun weekend poll and news gathering.

The telephone poll conducted on June 27 and 28 showed that Koike, 67, was the choice of 80 percent of supporters of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and a majority of backers of its junior coalition partner, Komeito.

Koike, a former Lower House member who is seeking her second four-year term, is also outdistancing the pack in term of unaffiliated voters, gaining support from about 70 percent of them.

The figures are based on respondents who revealed their choice. Thirty percent of voters who were contacted in the poll declined to identify their preferred candidate.

Kenji Utsunomiya, a former chief of the Japan Federation of Bar Associations, has yet to consolidate support from supporters of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP), although the main opposition has backed him in the race, according to the poll.

The Japanese Communist Party is standing behind the campaign of Utsunomiya, 73, but he is also having trouble winning over JCP supporters.

Only 10 percent of unaffiliated voters plan to vote for Utsunomiya, the poll showed.

Many of his supporters are in their 60s or older.

Taro Yamamoto, head of the Reiwa Shinsengumi political party, has solidified support among the party’s backers as well as a portion of CDP supporters.

But he has been unable to broaden his appeal to voters with no party affiliation. Only about 10 percent of them have cited Yamamoto, 45, as their preferred choice in the election, the poll showed.

Taisuke Ono, 46, a former vice governor of Kumamoto Prefecture who is endorsed by Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party), is having a hard time garnering support from unaffiliated voters. By age group, he has a relatively wider backing from voters in their 40s and 50s.

Takashi Tachibana, the 52-year-old head of NHK Kara Kokumin wo Mamoru To (Party to protect the public from NHK), has gained only limited support from voters, according to the survey. Japan Broadcasting Corp., a public broadcaster, is known as NHK.

THE OLYMPIC QUESTION

Although Koike has signaled her plans to go ahead with Tokyo hosting the Olympics and Paralympics next summer, voters are split over the issue, the poll showed.

It remains unclear whether the COVID-19 pandemic, the reason the Games were postponed until next year, will be brought under control by then.

When asked to pick one of three options concerning the fate of the sports extravaganza, 35 percent chose the Olympics should be held next summer as rescheduled.

Twenty-eight percent replied that the event should be postponed again, while 31 percent picked the option of canceling it.

Regardless of the answers picked, Koike was still the most cited candidate for next governor.

Concerning the metropolitan government’s handling of the COVID-19 health crisis, 63 percent approved of the response, compared with 29 percent who answered the opposite.

When asked about the priority issue facing the new governor concerning the pandemic, 64 percent picked stemming the spread of the disease and 26 percent cited re-energizing the economy.

The poll was conducted by contacting landline numbers in Tokyo selected at random by computer. Valid responses were received from 1,326, or 58 percent, of the 2,294 households with an eligible voter.

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