Prime minister Fumio Kishida’s ruling coalition is heading for a clear victory in elections for Japan’s upper house of Parliament, presenting a historic opportunity to revise the country’s pacifist constitution. State broadcaster NHK’s exit polls last night suggest that the LDP and its coalition partner, Komeito, won 73 of the 125 seats up for grabs. The vote came two days after the country’s longest-serving prime minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated by a lone gunman while giving a campaign speech in the western city of Nara.
Analysts had initially expected voter turnout to be a historic low. But projections from NHK suggest that more people voted than in the 2019 election after political parties united in condemning Abe’s shooting as “a challenge to democracy”.
The strong outcome gives Prime minister Kishida a chance to revise Article 9, which stipulates that land, sea, and air forces will never be maintained. This was a life-long ambition for former PM Abe.
