Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is projected to win a thumping victory in snap elections.
Capitalising on her honeymoon start as Japan’s first woman premier, Takaichi’s ruling bloc looked on course to have secured a two-thirds majority in the lower house, according to media estimates.
If confirmed, it would be the best result for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) since elections in 2017 under Takaichi’s mentor, assassinated former prime minister Shinzo Abe.
The LDP alone was seen winning about 300 of the 465 seats up for grabs, up from 198, and regaining a majority lost in 2024 – and potentially a super-majority on its own.
“We received backing for Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s responsible, proactive fiscal policies and a strengthening of national defence capabilities,” LDP secretary-general Shunichi Suzuki told Japanese media.
The new Centrist Reform Alliance of the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP) and the LDP’s previous partner Komeito looked to have lost more than two-thirds of its 167 seats.
The anti-immigration Sanseito party was projected to have increased its seats from two to between five and 14, broadcaster NHK said.
Takaichi has injected new life into the LDP, which has governed Japan almost non-stop for decades but which has lost support in recent elections because of unhappiness about rising prices and corruption.
Takaichi, 64, was a heavy metal drummer in her youth, an admirer of Britain’s “Iron Lady” Margaret Thatcher, and on the ultra-conservative fringe of the LDP when she became party chief and prime minister in October.
She has defied pessimists to be a hit with voters, especially young ones, with fans lapping up everything from her handbag to her jamming to a K-pop song with South Korea’s president.
But she will have to deliver on the economy.
“With prices rising like this, what matters most to me is what policies they’ll adopt to deal with inflation,” Chika Sakamoto, 50, told AFP at a voting station.
“Prices for just about everything are really going up, but incomes aren’t rising much, so our disposable income is shrinking,” she said.
However, Takaichi has not had everything her own way, particularly with regard to worries about her stewardship of the public finances of Asia’s number-two economy.
Japan’s debt is more than twice the size of the entire economy, and in recent weeks yields on long-dated bonds have hit record highs, causing jitters worldwide. — AFP
