A long-time ally of outgoing Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Yoshihide Suga has on Monday won a ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leadership election.
71-year-old Suga, who served in the powerful post of chief cabinet secretary during Abe’s nearly eight-year tenure took 377 of a total of 534 votes from Liberal Democratic Party lawmakers and regional representatives, against two rivals paving the way for him to become prime minister in a parliamentary vote this week because of the LDP’s majority in the lower house.
Former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, one of the other two contenders, received 89 votes, while former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba got 68.
Suga, the son of a strawberry grower in northern Japan’s Akita prefecture, said in his victory speech he had come a long way, “I will devote all of myself to work for the nation and the people.”
Suga who has said he would pursue Shinzo Abe’s key economic and foreign policies.
After the vote Abe said “now I’m handing the baton to new LDP President Suga,” adding that they “can count on him.”