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  World   Asia  14 Sep 2020  Japan ruling party elects Yoshihide Suga as PM successor

Japan ruling party elects Yoshihide Suga as PM successor

AFP
Published : Sep 14, 2020, 12:37 pm IST
Updated : Sep 14, 2020, 12:37 pm IST

Given the LDP's legislative majority, Suga is expected to handily win a parliamentary vote Wednesday and become Japan's next prime minister

Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga reacts after being elected as new head of Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party at the party's leadership election in Tokyo on September 14, 2020. - Japan's ruling party on September 14 elected chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga as its new leader, making him all but certain to replace Shinzo Abe as the country's next prime minister. (AFP)
 Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga reacts after being elected as new head of Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party at the party's leadership election in Tokyo on September 14, 2020. - Japan's ruling party on September 14 elected chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga as its new leader, making him all but certain to replace Shinzo Abe as the country's next prime minister. (AFP)

Tokyo: Japan's ruling party on Monday elected chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga as its new leader, making him all but certain to replace Shinzo Abe as the country's next prime minister.

Suga easily won the ballot, taking 377 of a total of 534 valid votes from Liberal Democratic Party lawmakers and regional representatives.

His rivals, former defence minister Shigeru Ishiba and LDP policy chief Fumio Kishida, trailed far behind.

Given the LDP's legislative majority, Suga is expected to handily win a parliamentary vote Wednesday and become prime minister, taking over from Abe, who is resigning for health reasons.

A powerful government adviser and spokesman, 71-year-old Suga is seen as promising stability and a continuation of Abe's policies.

He has specifically said his candidacy was motivated by a desire to continue the outgoing prime minister's programmes.

Ishiba, who is popular with the Japanese public but less so within his own party, won just 68 votes, with Kishida, who was once considered Abe's favoured successor, taking 89.

Abe, who smashed records as Japan's longest-serving prime minister before being forced to resign after a recurrence of ulcerative colitis, declined to publicly endorse any candidate.

The son of a strawberry farmer, Suga was raised in Japan's northern Akita region, and the issues of rural areas suffering depopulation are said to be among his top concerns.

But not much is known about his personal ideology, and he is generally viewed as an adherent of neither the LDP's most hawkish nor its more reformist wings.

As prime minister, he will face a series of tough challenges, including containing the coronavirus and righting the world's third-biggest economy, which was in recession even before the pandemic.

Tags: yoshihide suga, liberal democratic party, next japan pm, pm abe