Japan's Cabinet Public Relations Office sets a budget of 62 billion won for next year... Low number of views on policy promotion videos

The Cabinet Public Relations Office has set a budget of KRW 62 billion for next year... “Policy promotion video views are low”

(Tokyo = Yonhap News) Correspondent Cho Sung-mi = As Sanae Takaichi's cabinet tries to increase the policy promotion budget ten times the existing budget, criticism is rising that the budget is being wasted.

The Asahi Shimbun reported on the 1st that the Japanese government is causing a stir by increasing next year's budget for the Cabinet Public Relations Office, which informs the Prime Minister's activities, to 7.2 billion yen (about 62.1 billion won), 10 times this year's budget.

Most of the Cabinet Public Relations Office's budget for next year, 6.6 billion yen (approximately 57 billion won), has been allocated to domestic publicity. It will be mainly used to produce videos explaining the Takaichi administration's major policies, such as 'responsible active finance'.

An official from the Prime Minister's Office explained the purpose of increasing the budget by saying that they would strengthen government publicity by posting videos on social media targeting young people who do not read newspapers or watch TV.

The Prime Minister's Office recently posted a video titled 'Honebuto Classroom' on the official YouTube channel, explaining the details of the Takaichi Cabinet's large-scale public-private investment implementation plan 'Honebuto Policy'.

The 25-minute video, in which Tokyo Hoteison, a comedy duo popular among young people, appeared in the role of a teacher and explained the Honebuto policy to students, who are young voters, was produced quickly like a TV entertainment program.

However, even in the second week of posting, the number of views was only 18,000.

Asahi pointed out that the video of Prime Minister Takaichi's press conference released on August 25th was viewed only 28,000 times in one month, and that attempts to promote policies through video could not find substance.

Ryoji Fujii, a professor at Hakuo University, also told this newspaper that he could not find a reasonable reason for the budget for the Cabinet Public Relations Office increasing tenfold next year, and argued that strict review should be conducted in the budget preparation process.

Asahi pointed out that the reason why the Takaichi administration is trying to increase the publicity budget appears to be that the Prime Minister values ​​communication through SNS, and that Prime Minister Takaichi, who posts SNS posts more frequently than any previous Prime Minister, responds less frequently to reporters from traditional media outlets.

Meanwhile, the opposition party continued to criticize Prime Minister Takaichi for attending the National Assembly less often than other prime ministers.

The opposition parties in Japan's House of Councilors (Senate) held a meeting with the National Assembly Policy Committee Chairpersons on the 29th of last month and reaffirmed their position that they will not recognize Prime Minister Takaichi's poor attendance at the National Assembly at the extraordinary session of the National Assembly to be held on the 5th.