While voters evaluate the ruling party’s financing scandals and the stagnant economy, they are also skeptical about the opposition’s talent and experience.

Japan is voting in its tightest elections in years, with new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) facing potentially their worst results since 2009 due to a funding scandal and inflation.

Opinion polls show the LDP and its longtime partner Komeito are likely to lose their comfortable majority in the lower house of parliament in Sunday’s elections.

Out of a total of 1,344 candidates, a record 314 are running for office as female candidates. Polls close at 20:00 (11:00 GMT) and early results are expected within a few hours.

Ishiba, 67, took office Oct. 1 to replace his predecessor, Fumio Kishida, who resigned following an outcry among LDP lawmakers over slush fund practices. Ishiba immediately called early elections in the hope of gaining more support.

But the LDP potentially faces its worst result since 2009; Although it is an unexpected change of government, it will likely plunge Japan into political uncertainty.

Ishiba has set a goal of holding 233 seats in the ruling coalition between the LDP and its junior Buddhist-backed partner, Komeito; That creates a majority in the 465-member lower house, the most powerful in Japan’s two-chamber parliament.

In his final campaign speeches on Saturday, Ishiba apologized for his party’s mismanagement of funds and vowed to “start over as an equal, fair, modest and honest party.” He said that only the LDP could govern Japan with the experience and reliable policies of the ruling coalition.

But voters in the world’s fourth-largest economy have been unsettled by rising prices and the effects of the party slush fund scandal that helped bring down the previous prime minister, Fumio Kishida.

“I made my decision by looking first and foremost at economic policies and measures to reduce inflation,” Tokyo voter Yoshihiro Uchida, 48, told AFP on Sunday. “I voted for people who were likely to make our lives better.”

Meanwhile, Japan’s largest opposition party, the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP), is also expected to make significant gains. Centrist leader former Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said Sunday’s elections were a rare chance for a change of government.

There was speculation in the local media that Ishiba might resign immediately to take responsibility and become Japan’s shortest-serving prime minister in the post-war period.

The current record is set by Japan during World War II in 1945. It belongs to Naruhiko Higashikuni, who served for 54 days (four more days than British leader Liz Truss in 2022) immediately after his defeat in World War II.

“LDP’s politics is to quickly implement policies against those who give them tons of cash,” Noda, 67, told supporters on Saturday.

“But those in vulnerable positions were ignored,” he added, accusing the government of providing inadequate support to earthquake survivors in central Japan.

Analysts suggest Ishiba may fall short of achieving his goal, but his LDP is expected to remain the top party in Japan’s parliament as voters have doubts about the opposition’s ability and experience.

Ishiba’s party is also being tested to break the legacy of late Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Experts say Abe’s policies have focused on security, trade and industry but largely ignored equality and diversity, and his nearly eight-year tenure has led to corruption.

“Public criticism of the slush fund scandal has intensified, and this criticism will not go away easily,” said Izuru Makihara, a professor of politics and public policy at the University of Tokyo. “There is a growing sense of justice and people are rejecting the privileges afforded to politicians.”