Peru’s dynamic first lady has presidential aura
Worldwide, Daily news | ankakh | February 20, 2013 13:59Humble crowds adore her populist gestures. Fans and critics alike call her the co-president. Her husband, a rebellious army officer turned moderate leader, says people who think his wife is too influential are sexist.
Peru’s first lady, Nadine Heredia, is a potent political force. A telegenic 36-year-old mother of three who started the Nationalist Party along with President Ollanta Humala, she weighs in on a range of policy issues behind the scenes and, in public, often serves as the government’s messenger.
Her prominent role has made her more popular than Humala – so popular that she is widely viewed as a potential successor to the 50-year-old president.
She is arguably her party’s only viable candidate after Humala and could become Peru’s first female president if an anti-nepotism law is struck down to allow her to run in 2016.
Heredia is as comfortable on the streets as she is posing for the covers of society magazines in designer gowns.
Her approval rating of 60 percent is 7 points higher than her husband’s, Ipsos says. That is remarkable because Humala’s twinning of pro-investment economic policies with expanded social welfare programs has made him Peru’s most popular leader in years.
Most of the dozen people interviewed for this article, from lawmakers and political operators to former cabinet officials and voters, referred to Heredia as “La Presidenta.”
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