Photo/Illutration Nobuteru Ishihara, special adviser to the Kishida Cabinet, meets with reporters on Dec. 6. (Koichi Ueda)

Just a week into his new job, Nobuteru Ishihara has resigned as special adviser to the Cabinet of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.

Ishihara, 64, came under heavy criticism after it emerged that the local chapter of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party he heads received about 600,000 yen ($5,300) in 2020 in government subsidies intended for businesses reeling from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kishida met with reporters Dec. 10 to announce he had accepted Ishihara’s resignation.

“I cannot deny that there was a lot of confusion in the short period he served in his post,” Kishida said. “I wish to apologize for that.”

Kishida personally called Ishihara, a veteran political ally, and asked him to serve as special adviser with a focus on measures to help rekindle tourism in Japan. Ishihara was formally appointed to the post on Dec. 3.

Ishihara phoned Kishida exactly a week later to say he thought it best to resign so his problems would not interfere with Kishida’s ability to carry out his duties as prime minister.

When Kishida was pressed by reporters to explain his decision to appoint Ishihara in the first place, he stated, “I felt that his experience and the posts he has served in would be a huge factor for moving forward on policy.”

Ishihara has served as party secretary-general, land minister and state minister in charge of economic revitalization. He was one of the first to express support for Kishida when he announced he was running for president of the LDP this autumn.

But in the October Lower House election, Ishihara was defeated in his single-seat district in Tokyo and failed to secure a seat through the proportional representation constituency, effectively rendering him unemployed.

Kishida drew flak for even considering someone who had just been rejected by voters as one of his policy brains. But at that time, Kishida said he asked Ishihara to take the post because he wanted to make full use of his experience to help the administration.

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