PM’s party wins a supermajority in Japan’s lower house
TOKYO—Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi‘s governing party secured a two-thirds supermajority in parliamentary elections, Japanese media reported, citing preliminary results.
The landslide victory was due, in large part, to the extraordinary popularity of Japan’s first female prime minister and allows her to pursue a significant conservative shift in Japan’s security, immigration and other policies.
Takaichi said she will emphasize policies meant to make Japan strong and prosperous.
NHK, citing vote count results, said Takaichi’s Liberal Democratic Party alone secured 316 seats by early Monday, comfortably surpassing a 261-seat absolute majority in the 465-member lower house, the more powerful of Japan’s two-chamber parliament.
That marks a record since the party’s foundation in 1955 and surpasses the previous record of 300 seats won in 1986 by late Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone.
With 36 seats won by its new ally, Japan Innovation Party, Takaichi’s ruling coalition has won 352 seats.
Despite the lack of a majority in the upper house, the huge jump from the preelection share in the superior lower house would allow Takaichi to make progress on a right-wing agenda that aims to boost Japan’s economy and military capabilities as tensions grow with China and she tries to nurture ties with the United States.
