Tokyo: Exit polls indicate that Japanese voters have returned Prime Minster Shinzo Abe’s ruling coalition to power in national elections on Sunday.

Japanese media released projections of the results shortly after polls closed at 8 p.m.

Abe dissolved the lower house less than a month ago, forcing the snap election. Up for grabs are 465 seats in the parliament’s more powerful lower house, which chooses the prime minister.

An election victory would boost Abe’s chances to head his Liberal Democratic Party for another three years after his current term ends next September. That could extend his premiership to 2021, giving him more time to pursue his longtime goal of revising Japan’s postwar constitution.