Upcoming Japan upper house election may bring surprises

Tokyo

THE outcome of Japan's upper house parliamentary election due on July 10 may not amount to the country's equivalent of the UK's "Brexit" vote - at least not in terms of the scope of its impact - but it could nevertheless bring some surprises in a contest whose result (rather like that of Brexit) is largely being taken for granted.

As the polls tell it (although the image of pollsters is more than a little tarnished nowadays) Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its chief coalition partner the New Komeito Party are all set to cruise to a convincing victory in the July 10 election.