Tuesday, July 05, 2011

What's South Sudan's president's ride?

A few of you may remember my Rides of Heads of State Series.  Through a lot of detective work, I figured out and catalogued the cars of every world leader.*

Well, very soon, we're going to have a new country-- South Sudan.  You may have already seen its president, Salva Kiir Mayardit, a.k.a. the dude with the black cowboy hat.  So what's his ride?  In a country the size of France, it only has 50 km of paved roads.  So of course, he has a Land Cruiser.

This is the only picture I could find of the president in a car.  So I had to use my sleuthing skills to identify the make and model of the vehicle.

Here is a picture of a Land Cruiser's interior for comparison.  Note the shapes of the windows, locations of the hand grips, and locations of the vents next to said grips.

Here is the (revised) final tally:
S-class: 61
Land Cruiser: 23
7 series: 16
A8: 11
Caddy: 7
Maybach: 6
Suburban/Yukon/Escalade: 6
Mitsubishi Montero/Pajero: 4
Phaeton: 4
G-wagen: 4
Holden-Chevy-Opel: 4
H2: 3
Toyota Crown: 3
Lincoln: 3
Jag: 2
ZIL: 2
Volvo: 2
Touareg: 2
Merc E-class: 2
Lancia: 2

One of each of the following: Hyundai, Skoda, A6, Peugeot, Renault, VW van, London taxi, Daimler, Toyota Century, Hongqi, Bentley, Rolls, Ford Fairlane, Aston Martin, SEAT, Ford Expedition, Nissan Patrol, Stutz, Suzuki, Camry, Toyota Sequoia, Proton, Land Rover, Ford F150, Mitsubishi Galant, Hummer H1, Chrysler Imperial, Mitsu L200 pick-up, Mazda truck, Hyundai Tucson.

The Mercedes S-class trounced the competition, beating the second place Toyota Land Cruiser by a margin of nearly 3:1.

Ratio of cars versus trucks/SUVs: 143:54

Vehicle nationality:
German: 109
Japanese: 38
Other: 27
American: 23

Most surprising: Tonga's London taxi, Malta's Cadillac CTS, Chile's Peugeot 607 (tied)
Most undignified: Thailand's VW van
Ugliest: China's Hongqi

*All 192 U.N. members plus Taiwan, the Vatican, Palestine, and Kosovo.

3 comments:

Tarlan said...

Just for info: Hongqi- translation is "Red Flag"

Maxichamp said...

@Tarlan: Were any Hongqis ever imported to the USSR?

Tarlan said...

Noup, newer. Fortunately :)