Tokyo: Sanae Takaichi was selected by Japan's ruling party as its new head on Saturday. This move would make her the country's first female prime minister.

The Liberal Democratic Party elected Takaichi, 64, in a bid to win the favour of a public angered by rising prices, driving them towards opposition groups that promise significant stimulus and clampdowns on foreigners.

A vote in parliament to choose a prime minister to replace Shigeru Ishiba is expected to be held on October 15. The new LDP president is likely to succeed Shigeru Ishiba as leader because the party, which has governed Japan for almost the entire postwar period, is the largest in parliament. However, this is not assured, as the party and its coalition partner lost their majorities in both houses under Ishiba's leadership in the past year.

A former internal affairs minister with an expansionary economic agenda, Takaichi inherits a party in crisis. Various other parties, including the fiscally expansionist Democratic Party for the People and the anti-immigration Sanseito, have been steadily luring voters, especially younger ones, away from the LDP.

Takaichi has also raised the possibility of revisiting an investment deal with U.S. President Donald Trump, which would lower his punishing tariffs in return for Japanese taxpayer-backed investment. Some Asian neighbours view her nationalistic positions as a symbol of its past militarism, which may rile South Korea and China. She also suggested this year that Japan could form a "quasi-security alliance" with Taiwan, the democratically governed island claimed by China.