Yoshihide Suga on Monday became the new head of Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) after securing 377 votes in the election held to pick a successor to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Suga, currently the chief Cabinet secretary in Shinzo Abe’s government won with a clear majority over former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida and former Defence Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who got 89 votes and 68 votes against Suga’s 377 votes.
Now that the LDP has chosen its new leader, there will be another vote on Wednesday in parliament, where he is almost certain to be made prime minister because of the LDP’s majority.
The development comes after PM Abe announced last month that he would resign due to health problems.
