October 18, 2018

The Justice Ministry on October 17 updated its webpage on the selective dual surname system to include an opinion poll result indicating that the general public supports the introduction of the system. The website update was oddly late given that the poll result was published eight months earlier.

Akahata on October 11 reported that at that time the webpage did not carry the latest result of the opinion poll and instead showed the previous result released five years earlier in which the percentage of opponents of the dual surname system (36.4%) outnumbered supporters (35.5%). In the latest result which came out in February this year, 43% are in favor and 29% are against the system’s introduction.

Past related articles:
> Public support for dual surnames reaches record high, but Justice Ministry neglects to mention [October 11, 2018]
> Couple with different last names sues government for damage caused by imposition of same surname [June 19, 2018]