Japan’s ruling Democratic party has chosen Yoshihiko Noda, finance minister, as its leader, paving the way for him to become the nation’s sixth new prime minister in just five years.
Mr Noda, 54, a relative fiscal conservative who has supported calls for higher taxes to fund reconstruction of the tsunami-devastated north-east coast and to balance the state’s books, defeated Banri Kaieda, economics minister, in a second round of voting by the DPJ’s nearly 400 Diet members on Monday.
Mr Noda, who defeated Mr Kaieda by 215 votes to 177, now faces the challenge of following through on campaign pledges to unify the fractious DPJ and revitalise its drive to transform the politics of the world’s third largest economy.