{"id":97043,"date":"2025-10-04T19:58:57","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T19:58:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=97043"},"modified":"2025-10-04T19:58:57","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T19:58:57","slug":"sanae-takaichi-set-to-become-japans-first-female-prime-minister","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=97043","title":{"rendered":"Sanae Takaichi set to become Japan\u2019s first female prime minister"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Japan\u2019s ruling conservative party has elected Sanae Takaichi as its new leader, positioning the 64-year-old to be Japan\u2019s first female prime minister.<\/p>\n

Takaichi is among the more conservative candidates leaning to the ruling party\u2019s right. A former government minister, TV host and avid heavy metal drummer, she is one of the best known figures in Japanese politics \u2013 and a controversial one at that.<\/p>\n

She faces many challenges, including contending with a sluggish economy and households struggling with relentless inflation and stagnant wages.<\/p>\n

She will also have to navigate a rocky US-Japan relationship and see through a tariff deal with the Trump administration agreed by the previous government.<\/p>\n

If confirmed as prime minister, one of Takaichi\u2019s key challenges will be uniting the party after a turbulent few years, which saw it rocked by scandals and internal conflicts.<\/p>\n

Last month, Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, whose term lasted just over a year, announced he would step down after a series of election defeats that saw the Liberal Democratic Party\u2019s (LDP) governing coalition lose its majority in both chambers of parliament.<\/p>\n

Prof Jeff Kingston, director of Asian Studies at Temple University in Tokyo, told the BBC that Takaichi was unlikely to have \u201cmuch success at healing the internal party rift\u201d.<\/p>\n

Takaichi belongs to the \u201chardline\u201d faction of the LDP, which believes that \u201cthe reason the LDP support has imploded is because it lost touch with its right-wing DNA\u201d, he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think she\u2019s in a good position to regain the right wing voters, but at the expense of wider popular appeal, if they go into a national election.\u201d<\/p>\n

Takaichi has been a long-time admirer of Britain\u2019s first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher. She is now ever closer to fulfilling her Iron Lady ambition.<\/p>\n

But many women voters don\u2019t see her as an advocate for progress.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe calls herself Japan\u2019s Margaret Thatcher. In terms of fiscal discipline, she\u2019s anything but Thatcher,\u201d Prof Kingston said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut like Thatcher she\u2019s not much of a healer. I don\u2019t think she\u2019s done much to empower women.\u201d<\/p>\n

Takaichi is a staunch conservative who\u2019s long opposed legislation allowing women to keep their maiden names after marriage, saying it is against tradition. She is also against same sex marriage.<\/p>\n

A prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of the late former leader Shinzo Abe, Takaichi has vowed to bring back his economic vision, known as Abenomics, which involves high fiscal spending and cheap borrowing.<\/p>\n

The LDP veteran is hawkish on security and aims to revise Japan\u2019s pacifist constitution.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s also a regular visitor to the controversial Yasukuni shrine where Japan\u2019s war dead, including some convicted war criminals, are memorialised.<\/p>\n

She will likely be confirmed by parliament, although not automatically like her predecessors, because the ruling party is in a much weaker position now, having lost its majority in both houses.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"SanaeJapan’s ruling conservative party has elected Sanae Takaichi as its new leader, positioning the 64-year-old to be Japan’s first female prime minister.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_2277560469115098_106292521332774":"","twitter_aToxNzczMzI3Njk4OTg4ODUxMjAxOw==_1773327698988851200":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9861,1910,3982,10,9,9862],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-female","category-international","category-japan","category-politics","category-popular","category-sanae-takaichi"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=97043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97043\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=97043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=97043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=97043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}