is the wife of the former Prime Minister of Japan, Yoshihide Suga.
Mariko Suga was born on 28 November 1953, in Shimizu, Shizuoka Prefecture, where her family ran a food wholesale business. She attended Shimizu Higashi High School and was a member of its archery club. Afterwards, she studied home economics at Shizuoka Women's University.
Suga worked as a live-in housekeeper in the home of politician Hikosaburo Okonogi. Her younger sister worked for Okonogi as a secretary. During this time, she met and soon married Yoshihide Suga, who was her sister's co-worker, also working as a secretary to Hikosaburo Okonogi. Mariko Suga became a housewife after marrying and the couple had three sons.
Yoshihide Suga subsequently became a Yokohama city councilman in 1987, a member of the House of Representatives in 1996 and rose to prominence as the long-serving Chief Cabinet Secretary under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe from 2012. Yoshihide Suga was appointed Prime Minister to succeed Abe in September 2020 and served until October 2021.