Japan Gets a New Prime Minister; Yoshihide Suga of LDP Takes Over

Suga will announce the members of his new cabinet before being formally inaugurated at a ceremony on Wednesday.

Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga was on Monday elected as the new leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.

(Photo: Wikipedia/Altered by The Quint)

Yoshihide Suga on Wednesday, 16 September, was elected as Japan’s prime minister, becoming the country’s first new leader in nearly eight years and facing a raft of challenges, including reviving an economy battered by the COVID-19 pandemic, Reuters reported.

Suga, the newly elected President of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was elected Prime Minister by Japan’s National Diet in an extraordinary session on Wednesday.

Later during the day, Suga will announce the members of his new cabinet before being formally inaugurated at a ceremony at the Imperial Palace, news agency IANS reported.

Soon after the news broke, PM Narendra Modi extended his congratulations to the newly elected Japanese PM.

At the age of 71, Suga will be the oldest Prime Minister of Japan to take office since Kiichi Miyazawa in 1991. His premiership will last through the remainder of Abe's term as LDP leader until September 2021.

In the run-up to his inauguration, Suga said he would continue to promote Abe's policies, including his "Abenomics" of aggressive monetary easing, fiscal stimulus and structural reforms, to breathe life back into the recession-hit Japanese economy, according to IANS.

Suga will also continue the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, utilising the 230 trillion yen (2.2 trillion US dollar) package allocated for tackling the disease.

(With inputs from Reuters and IANS.)