CAR AND DRIVER




 

When first elected to parliament, Sanae Takaichi owned an A70-chassis Toyota Supra Turbo, driving it to work for over 20 years.
 

• Sanae Takaichi is about to become Japan's first female prime minister.
• When first elected to parliament, she owned a 1991 Supra 2.5GT Twin-Turbo Limited, driving it to work for over two decades.
• The car was freshly restored last year, and it can be seen in a small museum in her home prefecture.

With her election to head of Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), the longtime politician has become Japan's first female prime minister in waiting. Later this month, it is expected that the Japanese parliament will confirm her appointment, giving the country its Margaret Thatcher moment.

And for Japan's "Iron Lady," only one car will do: the Mk 3 Toyota Supra Turbo she's owned since the 1990s.

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Don't let the name of her political party fool you; Takaichi is a staunch conservative. Among her stated political views is the opinion that married women should not be allowed to keep their own last names after marriage.

Born the daughter of an office-worker father and a mother in the police services, she grew up in Nara Prefecture, south of Osaka. In 1993, she was elected to parliament as a representative of the region.

Two years earlier, at the age of 30, she had scrimped and saved to buy her first new car. The Takaichis already had some brand loyalty, as Sanae's father worked for a company that had an affiliation with Toyota, and she had selected the Supra as a replacement for her beloved used Celica XX, which was called the Celica Supra when sold on this side of the Pacific.

Here's how she spec'd it: Super White Pearl Mica, burgundy leather interior, 1JZ-GTE twin-turbocharged 2.5-liter inline-six with 276 hp, and a four-speed automatic transmission. Sometime later, she added a Panasonic navigation system.

As a grand tourer par excellence, it was just the thing for a politician on the rise to drive around campaigning, then cruise down the expressway to the National Diet in Tokyo.

What's exceptional is that Takaichi never gave the car up. For more than two decades, as her career took her to ministerial positions right at the highest levels of the LDP, she kept driving her 1991 Supra 2.5GT Twin-Turbo Limited.

The car came off the road sometime around the early 2000s, as Takaichi moved into government positions that saw her getting chauffeured around. However, she did not relinquish the keys, keeping the Supra stored at a local shop in Nara.

Last year, during a failed bid to gain the LDP leadership, the Toyota dealer in Nara who sold Takaichi the car new decided the old machine needed a bit of TLC. Ten volunteer automotive technicians and paint and bodywork specialists went to work, bringing the car back to its former glory.

Takaichi's pearl white Supra can now be found at the Nara Toyota dealership's small museum, complete with a stand-up display of the woman poised to be Japan's first female PM. Really, she couldn't have driven anything else.