Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's minority government has made a series of concessions to gain opposition support for its supplementary budget, which passed the House of Representatives on Thursday.

Ishiba's efforts to win the support of not just the Democratic Party for the People (DPP), with which the ruling bloc has a partial alliance, but also Nippon Ishin no Kai reflect his desire to gain their cooperation in the parliamentary session to be convened next month.

He also apparently aims to prevent opposition parties from uniting ahead of next summer's election for the House of Councilors.

But with the ruling and opposition camps still divided over plans for a fresh revision of the political funds control law, it remains to be seen whether Ishiba's approach, which appears haphazard, can continue to work.

Maehara's sudden change

The Ishiba administration secured Nippon Ishin's support for the extra budget by promising to discuss the party's flagship policy of making education free.

"It is extremely important to discuss this issue with many parties," the prime minister told a Lower House Budget Committee meeting Thursday.

The policy heads of Nippon Ishin, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its junior coalition partner, Komeito, met earlier that day and agreed to enter talks on education policy.

Nippon Ishin co-leader Seiji Maehara then announced that his party will vote in favor of the budget, making it the second opposition party after the DPP to do so.

The ruling bloc obtained the DPP's backing the day before by accepting the party's proposal to raise minimum taxable annual income from ¥1.03 million ($6,700) from next year.

While doing this, the coalition also proposed policy discussions to Nippon Ishin in private. It also accepted an amendment to the draft budget demanded by the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP) to boost reconstruction funding for areas on the Noto Peninsula in Ishikawa Prefecture battered by natural disasters.

"We wanted to build relationships" with opposition forces ahead of deliberations on the fiscal 2025 regular budget in the next parliamentary session, a senior LDP member said.

The developments also reflect opposition parties' desires to raise their profiles by realizing policies.

Maehara, who left the DPP last year in protest of its cozying up to the ruling bloc, on Thursday told a news conference that he thought "there is something to learn from the DPP's position."

"Maehara must have been anxious to gain results," a young DPP member said of the about-face.

Rift over corporate donations

Ishiba touted the ruling bloc's talks with the opposition when speaking to reporters just after the Lower House passage of the extra budget, saying, "It was not just speaking and just listening. We had a deliberation."

However, he has told those close to him that "anything is fine as long as budgets and bills are passed." His efforts to win over opposition parties were made hastily, as the Dec. 21 end of the parliamentary session is approaching.

The LDP apparently wants to prevent opposition forces from unifying their candidates in next summer's Upper House poll. With opposition parties divided on their stances on the extra budget, an LDP heavyweight gloated over the success in undermining opposition unity.

Discussions in the Lower House on the supplementary budget, criticized for its huge size, are seen as having been anything but thorough.

The latter half of the current parliamentary session will likely focus on whether the political funds control law can be revised again. Deliberations on the nine bills submitted over the issue began in earnest Thursday at the Lower House Special Committee on Political Reform.

The CDP, Nippon Ishin and the Japanese Communist Party have called for a ban on corporate and group donations, while the LDP seeks to maintain them. The two sides remain apart.

Shinjiro Koizumi, executive at the LDP's Political Reform Task Force, argued that corporate and group donations were not involved in the party's slush funds scandal, which prompted the latest reform efforts.

The DPP is expected to hold the casting vote over this issue as well, given that Ishiba's administration wants to enact the legal revision without extending the parliamentary session.

A Komeito executive said that the LDP is poised to approve a bill to set up a third-party body to oversee political funds, jointly submitted by Komeito and the DPP.

But the public is opposed to corporate and group donations, so Komeito and the DPP face the risk of running afoul of public opinion if they make moves seen as helping the LDP over this issue.

"Even if it is difficult during the current parliamentary session, we should have a clear timeline" for banning corporate and group donations, CDP Executive Deputy President Hiroshi Ogushi told the Lower House special committee.