Four daughters of the late Gin-san, who, with her centenarian twin Kin-san, was popular in the 1990s, have joined the campaign against illegal scams targeting elderly people.
The late twins, whose real names were Kin Narita and Gin Kanie, rose to fame after they were featured in a TV commercial when they were 100 years old.
The candid, cheerful centenarians became national idols because they were viewed as a symbol of elderly Japanese leading happy lives.
Kin-san died in 2000 at age 107, and the following year Gin-san passed away at the age of 108.
The four daughters of the late Gin-san — Toshiko Yano, 98, Chitayo Tsuda, 93, Yuriko Sano, 91, and Mineyo Kanie, 88 — are in good health, which is one of the reasons they in turn have recently drawn attention and have become popular among the public. All four live in Nagoya.
The Aichi Prefectural Government plans to hold a ceremony Aug. 29 to appoint them poster girls for the anticrime campaign, in which they will be featured in events and various media to warn elderly people of scam artists.
"Probably they are the oldest campaign girls in Japan. By using their power, we'd like to give much publicity to the campaign," an Aichi government official said.
