Irene Lailin Sáez Conde (born 13 December 1961 in Chacao, Miranda,

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

) is a

n politician and

beauty queen A beauty pageant is a competition that has traditionally focused on judging and ranking the physical attributes of the contestants. Pageants have now evolved to include inner beauty, with criteria covering judging of personality, intelligence, ...

who was crowned

Miss Universe 1981 Miss Universe 1981, the 30th anniversary of the Miss Universe pageant, was held on 20 July 1981 at the Minskoff Theatre in New York City, United States. Irene Sáez of Venezuela was crowned by Shawn Weatherly of the United States. There were 77 ...

. She has been a

model A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the Plan_(drawing), plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a mea ...

, was the mayor of Chacao (a municipality of

Caracas Caracas (, ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas, abbreviated as CCS, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the ...

), Governor of the state of

Nueva Esparta The Nueva Esparta State (in Spanish: ''Estado Nueva Esparta'', ), is one of the 23 states of Venezuela. It comprises Margarita Island, Coche, and the largely uninhabited Cubagua. The state has the smallest area, and is located off the northe ...

and a former presidential candidate.

Early life and education

Irene Lailin Sáez Conde, was born and spent her childhood in Chacao, Miranda, (

). Her father, Carlos Sáez and her mother, Ligia Conde, who died when Irene was three years old.

Career

1981–1989: Pageant wins and early political roles

Early in her career, Sáez was named the Queen of Club Campestre Los Cortijos for three years in a row. Sáez was crowned

Miss Venezuela 1981 Miss Venezuela 1981 was the 28th Miss Venezuela pageant, was held in Caraballeda, Vargas state, Venezuela, on May 7, 1981, after weeks of events. The winner of the pageant was Irene Sáez, Miss Miranda. The pageant was broadcast live on Venevis ...

and later, crowned

at the 30th annual pageant in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

at the age of 19. After spending a year traveling the world as Miss Universe, Sáez had studied political science at the

Central University of Venezuela The Central University of Venezuela (Spanish: ''Universidad Central de Venezuela''; UCV) is a public university of Venezuela located in Caracas. It is widely held to be the highest ranking institution in the country, and it also ranks 18th in L ...

, and then served successfully a year as Venezuela's cultural representative to the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...

expanding the international contacts developed into the realm of culture and diplomacy.

1990–1997: Mayor of Chacao

In the early 1990s, Sáez turned to electoral politics and a week after the November 1992 coup attempt, led by

Hugo Chávez Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías (; 28 July 1954 – 5 March 2013) was a Venezuelan politician who was president of Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013, except for a brief period in 2002. Chávez was also leader of the Fifth Republ ...

, she was elected mayor of

Chacao Municipality Chacao is one of the five political and administrative subdivisions of the city of Caracas, Venezuela. The other four are Baruta, El Hatillo, Libertador and Sucre. This legal entity is known as the Caracas Metropolitan District. Chacao is also o ...

, in

. Unbeknownst to Sáez at the time, her political future would continue to be tied to Chávez's rise in the country. In office as mayor of

, Sáez tackled Chacao's high crime rate by professionalising the municipal police force, with university graduates as officers, higher pay, new police vehicles, and a variety of mobility devices (including roller skates and mountain bikes) allowing the police to move around quicker. Crime fell dramatically as a result of her innovative ideas. Without political experience or an established party machine, Sáez was content to delegate on experts, and "hired top-notch administrators and listened to their advice about everything from setting the budget to running public services." In December 1995, Sáez was reelected as mayor of Chacao with 96% of the vote, the highest share of the vote in Venezuela's democratic history. ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

'' of London ranked her 83rd in its list of the 100 most powerful women in the world.. In 1997, she was awarded the Distinguished Achievement Award at the

Miss Universe Pageant Miss Universe is an annual international beauty pageant that is run by a United States and Thailand based Miss Universe Organization.Natalie Tadena (July 2, 2015"Donald Trump's Miss USA Pageant Lands on Reelz Cable Channel". ''The Wall Stre ...

, a recently created prize of the Miss Universe Organization. She made her acceptance speech in both English and Spanish. Sáez was received in the International Airport Simón Bolívar by former president of Venezuela,

Luis Herrera Campins Luis Antonio Herrera Campins (4 May 1925 – 9 November 2007) was the president of Venezuela from 1979 to 1984. He was elected to one five-year term in 1978. He was a member of COPEI, a Christian Democratic party. Early life and career Luis ...

and he gave her a chain of gold for her victory in Miss Universe.

1998: Presidential campaign

Sáez kept her distance from mainstream parties for as long as she could, and in 1997 formed the Integrated Representation of New Hope (IRENE) Party as a launch pad for her eventual run in the December 1998 presidential elections. In the final poll of the year in December 1997 she reached almost 70% support – just one year prior to the presidential elections. However, despite spending millions of dollars on publicity, Sáez fell below 15% within six months, as the public became increasingly skeptical of her readiness for the presidency and she lost credibility as an anti-establishment candidate after accepting the endorsement of COPEI, an invitation analysts now see as a political trap for a candidate ahead of her times. Sáez won the internal COPEI primary election with 62.7% of the vote, against Eduardo Fernandez's 35.7%, at an extraordinary convention with 1,555 COPEI delegates taking place at a Caracas hotel, an endorsement earned after COPEI realized their original male candidate was unable to win. Its leaders ascertained their best bet to remain competitive nationally was replace him with the charismatic yet independent Irene Sáez, transforming her into the first independent and female candidate supported by a major political party for the presidency of Venezuela. Sáez was credited with bringing to national politics the voice of a vast majority of Venezuelans disenchanted with politics as usual, wrapped in the familiar sophistication of a global beauty queen with ties to the elite class. Because of her physical attractiveness and ability to speak, public newspapers like ''El Nacional'' described her television appearances as "Reaganesque". To make herself more politically familiar, Sáez adopted Argentina's

Eva Perón María Eva Duarte de Perón (; ; 7 May 1919 – 26 July 1952), better known as just Eva Perón or by the nickname Evita (), was an Argentine politician, activist, actress, and philanthropist who served as First Lady of Argentina from June 194 ...

's hair style and fiery language of social revolution. Her strong speech preceded

's as she was a presidential candidate for years before him. Sáez ran on a platform of ending corruption, reducing bureaucracy and refinancing public debt. Her campaign slogan was "a revolution is possible". Ultimately, COPEI's former president,

Rafael Caldera Rafael Antonio Caldera Rodríguez ( (); 24 January 1916 – 24 December 2009), twice elected the president of Venezuela, served for two five-year terms (1969–1974 and 1994–1999), becoming the longest serving democratically elected leade ...

, pardoned Chávez for the attempted coup against Pérez, from the opposing Democratic Action party, making possible his eventual ascendance to power. Ultimately she finished a distant third with 2.82% of the vote.

1999–2000: Governor of Nueva Esparta and boards

Soon after the 1998 presidential election, Sáez was elected Governor of the state of

, in an election made necessary by the January 1999 death in office of Rafael Tovar. She won overwhelmingly with more than 70% of the votes, defeating the candidate of Democratic Action. She served as governor of the state until 2000, stepping down when she became pregnant, denying rumors that she was pushed aside by Chávez. Since 2003, Sáez lives currently in

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

where she was named to the

board of directors A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervises the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organiz ...

of the Colonial BancGroup, south Florida region.

References

External links

Analysis of the political career of Irene Sáez

;Video * ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAEOP8oR6cE YouTube: Final Miss Venezuela 1981br>YouTube: Miss Universe 1981 Coronation
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saez, Irene 1961 births Central University of Venezuela alumni Governors of Nueva Esparta Living people Mayors of places in Venezuela Miss Universe 1981 contestants Miss Universe winners Miss Venezuela winners People from Caracas Venezuelan beauty pageant winners Women mayors of places in Venezuela 20th-century Venezuelan women politicians 20th-century Venezuelan politicians Universidad Metropolitana alumni Women state governors of Venezuela Beauty queen-politicians