Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's ruling bloc was headed for a big win in today's election, bolstering his chance of becoming the nation's longest-serving premier and re-energising his push to revise the pacifist constitution.
Mr Abe's Liberal Democratic Party-led (LDP) coalition has won a combined 310 seats, reaching a two-thirds "super majority" in the 465-member lower house, with 11 seats still up for grabs, broadcaster TV Asahi said.
A hefty win raises the likelihood that Mr Abe, who took office in December 2012, will have a third three-year term as LDP leader next September and go on to become Japan's longest-serving premier.
It also means his "Abenomics" growth strategy centred on the hyper-easy monetary policy will likely continue.
Final official results from the election, which coincided with an approaching typhoon, are expected early tomorrow.
The US-drafted constitution's Article 9, if taken literally, bans the maintenance of armed forces. But Japanese governments have interpreted it to allow a military exclusively for self-defence.
Backers of Mr Abe's proposal to clarify the military's ambiguous status say it would format the status quo. Critics fear it would allow an expanded role overseas for the military.
Mr Abe said he would not stick to a target he had floated of making the changes by 2020.
"First, I want to deepen debate and have as many people as possible agree," he said. "We should put priority on that."
The LDP's junior partner, the Komeito, is cautious about changing the constitution, drawn up after Japan's defeat in World War Two.
Several opposition parties favour changes, but don't necessarily agree on details.
Mr Abe had said he needed a new mandate to tackle a "national crisis" from North Korea's missile and nuclear threats and a fast-aging population, and to approve his idea of diverting revenue from a planned sales tax hike to education and childcare from public debt repayment.
Typhoon brings heavy rain, wind to election-day Japan
Tens of thousands of people across Japan were advised to evacuate, hundreds of flights were cancelled and train services were disrupted as a typhoon moved toward the coast, bringing heavy rain and strong winds as people went to the polls.
Typhoon Lan, classified as an intense Category 4 storm by the Tropical Storm Risk monitoring site, was south of Japan and moving northeast at 40km/h, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said.
An agency official told a news conference that while Lan appeared to have weakened slightly from its peak, it was still a powerful storm that could pound parts of Japan with more than 80mm of rain an hour.
It may make landfall near Tokyo early tomorrow.
The agency issued warnings for heavy rain and flooding on the Pacific side of Japan including the Tokyo metropolitan area, even though the typhoon is likely to be downgraded to Category 3 by this evening, with the activity of a seasonal rain front intensified by the storm.
More than 70,000 households in various parts of Japan were advised to evacuate, with more than 5,000 ordered to do so, NHK public television said.
Several small landslides had occurred and rivers were rising dangerously close to the top of their banks in several parts of the country.
Mr Abe told reporters he had called on the government to take steps as early as possible to minimise any threats to people's lives.
More than 300 flights were cancelled and rail services were interrupted in southern and western parts of the country.
By evening local time, wind and rain were intensifying in Tokyo.
Toyota Motor Corp said it was cancelling the first shift at all of its assembly plants around the nation.
