Japan’s next prime minister is a bit of a maverick 

The 67-year-old Shigeru Ishiba will become Japan’s new prime minister on 1 October after winning a surprisingly exciting play-off vote against his rival Sanae Takaichi. For a moment it looked as if Japanese MPs were set to elect the country’s first female leader (Takaichi was ahead of Ishiba in the first round of voting) but in the end the Liberal Democratic party (LDP) opted for experience and former defence minister Ishiba’s safe, and crucially clean pair of hands.

Ishiba is at first glance a typical Japanese politician and an unexciting choice for PM. He’s a former banker and has been in politics for nearly 40 years. He doesn’t have a particularly interesting backstory or much in the way of charisma. He looked like the dullest of the final three candidates. The other two were fun: Takaichi was once in a heavy metal band and is a Margaret Thatcher acolyte, and Shinjiro Koizumi (son of former PM Junichiro) has boy band looks and was given to amusing Kamala-esque word salad pronouncements.