Japan’s first female leader wrestles with sumo’s ban on women

TOKYO — As Japan’s first female prime minister, Sanae Takaichi has broken new ground in a country that struggles with gender equality. But she has quickly run up against a tradition that may be immovable.

Trophies for sumo wrestling, Japan’s national sport, are sometimes presented by the country’s top leader — most recently in January, when Shigeru Ishiba, the prime minister at the time, awarded the winner’s trophy at the New Year Grand Sumo Tournament in Tokyo.

But awkward questions arose ahead of the Kyushu Grand Sumo Tournament, which concludes Sunday in the Japanese city of Fukuoka. Takaichi is prohibited from entering the ring according to the rules of sumo, which consider women impure.

Takaichi will have a chance to sidestep the issue as the Japanese leader is expected to attend the G20 summit in South Africa this weekend amid a diplomatic spat with China.

But the dilemma could resurface during the New Year’s tournament in Tokyo.

In Japan, sumo is not just a sport but a 1,500-year-old tradition that is held sacred in the nation of over 100 million people. It has deep roots in Shinto, Japan’s Indigenous religion.

Experts suggested Takaichi, a hard-line conservative elected last month whose policies are not seen as particularly pro-women, is likely to avoid the issue altogether so as not to challenge tradition, and send another high-ranking government official instead.

“She doesn’t want to upset her supporters or conservatives,” said Hiromi Murakami, an expert on Japanese politics at Temple University in Japan.

“They don’t want to even see a discussion around the topic,” she said.

Minoru Kihara, the Japanese government’s top spokesperson, said last week that Takaichi “holds the view that Japan’s sumo culture is a traditional art form that should be cherished.”

She “intends to respect the traditions of sumo culture,” he later told reporters in Tokyo.

Reached for comment this week, the Japan Sumo Association said it had not received any request from Takaichi’s office regarding her involvement. The association told the Asahi Shimbun newspaper this month, “We believe it is our mission to pass down the traditional culture of sumo.”

This is not the first time there have been questions as to whether a high-ranking female official would be allowed to enter the sumo ring, also known as the dohyo.

In 1990, Mayumi Moriyama became Japan’s first female chief Cabinet secretary, who often represents the government at sumo trophy ceremonies. The sumo association did not allow her to do so.

The association rejected another request in 2000 by Japan’s first female governor, Fusae Ohta, to enter the sumo ring at a tournament in the city of Osaka. She ultimately presented the trophy on a walkway next to the dohyo.

In 2018, a female mayor, Tomoko Nakagawa of the city of Takarazuka, was denied a request to make a speech in the ring. That same year, the association apologized after two women were ordered out of the ring when they rushed to the aid of a mayor who had collapsed inside it.

Such incidents underscore the challenges that continue to face women in Japan, which ranked 118th out of 148 countries in the World Economic Forum’s 2025 Global Gender Gap Report.

Sumo wrestling has also proved popular on the rare occasion a competition is held outside Japan. Last month, tickets sold out for the Grand Sumo Tournament at London’s Royal Albert Hall, which hosted the event for the first time in 34 years.

“It’s quite interesting that they went to the U.K.,” Murakami said. “If there’s a female political leader who wants to give the trophy, what would happen then?”

Arata Yamamoto reported from Tokyo, and Jay Ganglani from Hong Kong.