kids encyclopedia robot

2020 Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) leadership election facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts
Quick facts for kids
2020 Liberal Democratic Party leadership election
← 2018 14 September 2020 2021 →
535 delegates in total
268 or more delegate votes needed to win
  Yoshihide Suga cropped 3 Joint Press Announcement of the Okinawa Consolidation Plan.jpg Fumio Kishida Minister.jpg Gates meets Ishiba 8 November 2007 cropped for Ishiba.jpg
Candidate Yoshihide Suga Fumio Kishida Shigeru Ishiba
LDP MPs 288 79 26
Prefectural votes 89 10 42
Total 377 89 68
Prefectures of Japan gray.svg
Map of Japan by prefecture.
President before election

Shinzo Abe

 Elected President

Yoshihide Suga

The 2020 Liberal Democratic Party of Japan leadership election was a special vote held on 14 September 2020. Its purpose was to choose the new leader of Japan's main political party, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). This election was important because the LDP had the most seats in the National Diet (Japan's parliament). This meant that the person chosen as the LDP leader would also become the new Prime Minister of Japan.

Yoshihide Suga, who was a top government official, easily won this election. As expected, he became Japan's new Prime Minister shortly after.

Why Did This Election Happen?

This election was not planned to happen so soon. It was originally set for September 2021. However, the leader of the LDP and Japan's Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, suddenly stepped down on 28 August 2020. He resigned because of health issues.

The person who won this election would finish the rest of Abe's term as party president. Since the Liberal Democratic Party had the most power in the National Diet, the winner also took over as Japan's Prime Minister.

Who Were the Main Candidates?

Three main people ran to become the new leader of the Liberal Democratic Party:

  • Fumio Kishida: He was in charge of the LDP's Policy Research Council. He was also a member of the House of Representatives. From 2012 to 2017, he served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

How the Votes Were Counted

The election used a special voting system. Votes came from two groups:

  • Diet members: These are members of Japan's parliament.
  • Prefectural representatives: These are representatives from different regions (prefectures) of Japan.

Each candidate needed to get a certain number of votes from both groups to win.

Who Won the Election?

The election results were announced on 14 September 2020. Here's how the votes turned out:

Results
Candidate Diet members Prefectural representatives Total points
Votes cast % Votes cast % Total votes %
Yoshihide Suga cropped 3 Joint Press Announcement of the Okinawa Consolidation Plan.jpg Yoshihide Suga 288 73.1% 89 63.1% 377 70.5%
Fumio Kishida Minister.jpg Fumio Kishida 79 20.1% 10 7.1% 89 16.6%
Gates meets Ishiba 8 November 2007 cropped for Ishiba.jpg Shigeru Ishiba 26 6.6% 42 29.8% 68 12.7%
Total 394 100% 141 100% 535 100%

As you can see, Yoshihide Suga won the election with a clear majority of votes. He received 377 total votes, which was 70.5% of all votes. This big win meant he became the new leader of the Liberal Democratic Party and, soon after, the Prime Minister of Japan.

Images for kids

See also

Kids robot.svg In Spanish: Elección de liderazgo del Partido Liberal Democrático de Japón de 2020 para niños

kids search engine
All content from Kiddle encyclopedia articles (including the article images and facts) can be freely used under Attribution-ShareAlike license, unless stated otherwise. Cite this article:
2020 Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) leadership election Facts for Kids. Kiddle Encyclopedia.